MILAN. Dec 7 (Interfax) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says he proposed discussing the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty at the NATO-Russia Council but that his NATO counterparts did not want to, said.
"We proposed discussing the INF Treaty issue in the NATO-Russia Council, that that didn't suit our NATO colleagues, who, by the way, have fully closed all channels of communication between the militaries of Russia and NATO," Lavrov told a press conference in Milan.
Commenting on concerns about the future of the INF Treaty expressed at the recent NATO summit, he said, "The people I talked to yesterday [on the sidelines of the OSCE Council of Foreign Ministers], including the German foreign minister, expressed concern about this situation. If they are concerned, they should probably influence their ally, the United States, get the Americans to sit down at the negotiating table and talk in a substantive way, instead of making unfounded accusations against us from overseas."
"We are ready for such a conversation," he said.