Deputy Foreign Minister Ryabkov: NATO will no longer be able to push Russia to secondary roles

Photo: Gleb Garanich / Reuters

NATO will no longer be able to push Russia back into secondary roles, said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov. His words are quoted by TASS.

Ryabkov also called on NATO “to collect money and return to the 1997 borders.”

The diplomat believes that it is naive to expect progress on security guarantees in the upcoming talks between Russia and the United States and NATO. “Even a layman understands that it will no longer be possible to demand concessions from Russia. It's all in the past. And earlier it didn’t work very well, but now it’s just put an end to it, ”he said.

Ryabkov believes that a positive outcome of Moscow's contacts with the United States and NATO on security guarantees will be confirmation of its readiness to work on Russian proposals.

Earlier, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said that Washington does not expect breakthroughs from the upcoming talks with Russia on security. He considers the main task to be the beginning of a dialogue with Russia in various formats, however, the “bar of success” regarding the negotiations is set quite low.

In mid-December 2021, the Russian Foreign Ministry published draft treaties between the Russian Federation, NATO and the United States on security guarantees in Europe. The document, in particular, states that Washington should not create military bases in the territories of the former USSR countries that are not NATO members. The United States also did not recommend using their infrastructure for any military activity and developing bilateral military cooperation with them.

The Russian-American consultations will take place in Geneva on January 9-10. Then a meeting of the Russia-NATO Council in Brussels and consultations in Vienna at the platform of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) are scheduled.