Russia, NATO in direct confrontation: Kremlin

MOSCOW, April 4

Russia and NATO are now in “direct confrontation”, the Kremlin said as the US-led alliance marked its 75th anniversary on Thursday.

NATO’s successive waves of eastern enlargement are a fixation of President Vladimir Putin, who went to war in Ukraine two years ago with the stated aim of preventing the alliance from coming closer to Russia’s borders. Instead, the war has galvanised NATO, which has expanded again with the entry of Finland and Sweden.

France asked not to send troops

• Russia’s defence minister warned his French counterpart against deploying troops to Ukraine in a rare phone call on Wednesday and noted that Moscow was ready to take part in talks to end the conflict
• Sergei Shoigu told French Defence Minister Sébastien Lecornu that if Paris sent a military contingent to Ukraine, “it will create problems for France itself”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters: “In fact, relations have now slipped to the level of direct confrontation.” NATO was “already involved in the conflict surrounding Ukraine (and) continues to move towards our borders and expand its military infrastructure towards our borders”, he said.

Putin has repeatedly said Russia was cheated by the West in the aftermath of the Cold War as Moscow’s Warsaw Pact alliance was disbanded but NATO moved eastwards by taking in former pact members and the three Baltic states that had been part of the Soviet Union. The West rejects that version, saying NATO is a defensive alliance and joining it was a democratic choice by countries. — Reuters

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