MOSCOW, April 27 (RIA Novosti) - NATO enlargement and the accession of Ukraine and Georgia to the bloc is a sensitive issue for Russia, which will need to spend considerable sums to reorient its military capabilities, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday.
Georgia and Ukraine are now seeking membership in NATO, arousing concerns in Moscow that the alliance will expand its influence in Russia's backyard and further straining relations with the former Soviet republics since "color revolutions" brought Western-leaning governments to power there.
"NATO's further enlargement agenda affects our relations," ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin said. "For us, it is an extremely sensitive issue, particularly in relation to Ukraine and Georgia."
Kamynin said that the alliance's plans would be a dramatic military and political shift affecting Russia's interests and causing it to reorganize its military industrial ties.
"It could influence arms control agreements," the diplomat said.
Kamynin said there were other mechanisms for broad cooperation with NATO that did not require formal membership in the alliance.
He also said Moscow still had questions to NATO about its facilities in new member countries, namely U.S. bases in Romania and Bulgaria.
"We hope that the alliance will observe its political and legal commitments in terms of military restraint when deciding on the deployment of the bases, and in particular the commitment not to deploy considerable combat forces in new member states," Kamynin said.
He also mentioned another stumbling bloc in Russia-NATO relations: the ratification of the Adapted Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty, which sought to establish a military balance on the continent.
"We cannot but be concerned about the situation around the ratification of the adapted CFE Treaty, which is a cornerstone of European security and the material basis for Russia-NATO relations," Kamynin said, adding that the subject would be high on the agenda at the third conference on CFE Treaty implementation due in Vienna in late May.
He said that although the current version of the document remained in force, it had stopped corresponding to present-day European reality, and called for immediate ratification of the adapted treaty.
NATO countries have said they will not ratify the document until Russia fulfills its commitments undertaken in 1999 in Istanbul with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, in particular a withdrawal of its troops from bases in Georgia. Russia sees no link between the two and Kamynin said such an approach was unlawful and counterproductive.
"Russia has done everything for the adapted CFE Treaty to come into force: it has complied with the flank limits, fulfilled all the relevant elements of Istanbul agreements and ratified the CFE Agreement on Adaptation," Kamynin said.
In another effort to comply with the Istanbul agreements, Kamynin said Russia was already working to pull out its military bases from Georgian territory by 2008.
Kamynin also urged NATO to respond to real security threats rather than hypothetical threats from the East.
"Russia is not a NATO member but we closely follow debates about its future," he said. "We are convinced that the alliance's reorientation from territorial defense (against the East) to real... security challenges in accordance with international law will definitely contribute to predictability and stability," Kamynin said.
He added that Russia favored NATO's increasing focus on political ties, closer interaction with the UN and the European Union, and aspiration for strategic partnership with Russia.
