Russia is willing to talk with the North Atlantic Alliance on de-escalation and incident prevention, but this discourse is pointless without military expertise, Spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova stated on her Telegram channel on Monday.
Zakharova said that Russia is not avoiding engagement with NATO and is open to a serious debate on de-escalation and incident prevention, adding that discussions on these topics would be pointless if military specialists were not included.
Earlier, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg urged restarting NATO-Russia Council (NRC) discussions, noting that Moscow had been asked to discuss more than a year ago but had not replied, TASS reports.
The NATO-Russia Council was founded in 2002 as a result of agreements made by Silvio Berlusconi’s Italian administration. The Council’s most recent meeting was in July of this year.
