MOSCOW. Feb 18 (Interfax) - Moscow views Washington's approach aimed at scanning the Russian Armed Forces' activities as unrealistic and lopsided, the Russian reply to the United States concerning proposals on security guarantees says.
The document circulated by the Russian Foreign Ministry on Thursday says that the U.S. did not reply to an idea from Paragraph 2 of Article 4 of a draft treaty on security proposed by Russia.
"The U.S. apparently assumes that military tensions can be eased through increasing transparency and taking extra risk reduction measures in line with the West's proposals on updating the Vienna Document. We view this approach as unrealistic and lopsided, and aimed at scanning the Russian Armed Forces' activities. The confidence and security building measures as stipulated in the 2011 Vienna Document are commensurate with the modern situation," the Russian reply, as translated from Russian by Interfax, says.
"To start discussing options for updating them, the necessary preconditions must be provided. To this end, the U.S. and its allies should abandon the policy of 'deterring' Russia and undertake tangible practical measures to de-escalate the military-political situation, including in line with Paragraph 2 of Article 4 of our draft treaty," it says.
"As concerns incident prevention at sea and in airspace over it, we welcome the U.S.' preparedness for relevant consultations. However, this work cannot substitute for settling the key problems brought up by Russia," it says.