Marines (“Black Berets”) in Kaliningrad. (RIA Novosti / Igor Zarembo)
Moscow has announced on Tuesday that it is “completely” ending activities under the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE), Russian news media outlets report, citing a statement posted on the Russian Foreign Ministry’s site.
The suspension finalizes Moscow’s unilateral moratorium on the implementation of the CFE treaty declared in a decree that was issued by President Vladimir Putin in 2007.
“The Russian Federation has taken the decision to halt its participation in meetings of the [consulting group] from March 11, 2015. Therefore, Russia is ending its actions in the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, announced in 2007, completely,” the statement from the Foreign Ministry said, according to RT.
“For years, the Russian side has been doing its best to maintain viability of the regime of control over conventional arms, it initiated talks on adapting the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, it ratified the agreement on Adapted CFE Treaty,” the statement said, according to TASS news agency.
“Regrettably, NATO countries have preferred to dodge CFE provisions by means of the alliance’s expansion and use any pretexts to prevent the Agreement on Adapted CFE Treaty from coming into effect. This course pursued despite our repeated warning about its harmful impacts on the regime of control over conventional weapons led to the unavoidable result – Russia’s suspending the CFE Treaty in 2007,” the statement said, according to TASS.
“Back then, the Russian side, taking into due account appeals from a number of the CFE Treaty signatories, decided to continue its participation in the work of the joint consultative group by way of exception,” the Russian diplomat noted. “Taking this decision, we hoped that this platform would be used to work out a new regime of control over conventional arms,” the statement said, according to TASS.
“In such conditions, Russia sees its further participation in meetings of the joint consultative group, which as a rule are reduced to reading out the agenda, as pointless from both political and practical points of view and as excessively costly from the financial and economic point of view,” the statement said, according to TASS.
The Ministry said that the move does not mean that Moscow refuses to continue further dialogue on control of conventional armed forces in Europe, “if and when our partners are ready for it,” and that future work on the project should serve the interests of both Russia and other European states.
Moscow has asked Belarus to represent Russia’s interests in the group starting from Wednesday, the statement said.
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