Putin says Russia must boost military given NATO's "aggressive actions"June 22, 2016 - 15:24 AMT PanARMENIAN.Net - Russia must boost its combat readiness in response to NATO's "aggressive actions" near Russia's borders, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday, June 22, Reuters reports. Addressing parliament on the 75th anniversary of Nazi Germany's attack on the Soviet Union, Putin berated the West for being unwilling to build "a modern, non-bloc collective security system" with Russia. "Russia is open to discuss this crucial issue and has more than once shown its readiness for dialogue," he said. "But, just as it happened on the eve of World War Two, we do not see a positive reaction in response." "On the contrary, NATO is strengthening its aggressive rhetoric and its aggressive actions near our borders. In these conditions, we are duty-bound to pay special attention to solving the task of strengthening the combat readiness of our country." The U.S.-led military alliance is increasing its defenses in Poland and the three Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as part of a wider deterrent that it hopes will discourage Russia from any repetition of its annexation of Ukraine's Crimea in 2014, Reuters says. Russia sees NATO's deterrence plans as hostile. Drawing historic parallels with the 1930s, Putin said humanity now faced a danger of failing to withstand the fast-spreading threat of terrorism, just as it once failed to unite against the rising power of Nazi Germany. Top stories Authorities said a total of 192 Azerbaijani troops were killed and 511 were wounded during Azerbaijan’s offensive. In 2023, the Azerbaijani government will increase the country’s defense budget by more than 1.1 billion manats ($650 million). The bill, published on Monday, is designed to "eliminate the shortcomings of an unreasonably broad interpretation of the key concept of "compatriot". The earthquake caused a temporary blackout, damaged many buildings and closed a number of rural roads. Partner news | Russia warns Armenia against “falling into West’s trap” Zakharova maintained, however, that anything that will benefit the people of Armenia can only be welcomed. CSTO: Armenia has not participated in secretariat’s work recently Recently Armenia has not participated in the work of the secretariat of the CSTO, Imangali Tasmagambetov said. Meeting with U.S., EU not against third parties, says Armenia The meeting scheduled for April 5 is dedicated to strengthening of the Armenia-EU-US cooperation, Yerevan added. Ucom launches network modernization efforts in few regions of Armenia In particular, on March 28, the legacy Mobile Switching Subsystem will be replaced with a new one. |