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Russian president to attend Russia-NATO Council summit

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Russian President Vladimir Putin will attend a Russia-NATO Council summit scheduled for early April, Russia's foreign minister said on Tuesday.
GENEVA, February 12 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President Vladimir Putin will attend a Russia-NATO Council summit scheduled for early April, Russia's foreign minister said on Tuesday.

"President Vladimir Putin has accepted the invitation to attend [the summit]. This once again proves that Russia is open to dialogue on any issue," Sergei Lavrov said.

The summit will be held in Bucharest on April 2-4. Presidential elections are set for March 2 in Russia. Putin is unable to stand for a third term, and will hand over his presidential duties to his successor in May.

The minister said Russia was ready to seek mutually acceptable solutions to collective security issues on the basis of equal partnership.

Lavrov recalled Putin's proposal that nuclear proliferation threats should be countered through cooperation between Russia, the United States and Europe.

"We are sure that the trilateral format possesses huge opportunities in all fields related to security and stability," the minister said.

He said this basis was suitable for solutions on the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty and Washington's plans to deploy elements of its missile defense system in Central Europe, as well as other urgent collective security problems.

Russia imposed in December 2007 a unilateral moratorium on the CFE treaty on arms reduction, but said it would resume its participation if NATO countries ratified the document.

The adapted version of the CFE treaty, aimed at regulating the deployment of non-nuclear weapons on the continent has so far been ratified only by Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

NATO countries' rejection of the updated version of the Soviet-era CFE has proved a major stumbling block in Russia-NATO relations.

Lavrov said that under the outdated version of the CFE treaty, NATO, which has significantly expanded since the end of the Warsaw Pact alliance, could increase armaments in Europe to an amount almost twice as large as the overall capacity of non-NATO CFE signatories.

The minister said Russia wants to know why NATO needs such a large reserve for arms increases, particularly given NATO's expansion eastward to Russia's borders.

"We are ready to continue talks in order to restore sustainable control over conventional forces," he said.

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