Russia pulls out of Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty

PanARMENIAN.Net - Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree suspending Russia's participation in the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty due to "extraordinary circumstances, which affect the security of the Russian Federation and require immediate measures".



Somme differences occurred between Russia and West in interpreting the CFE agreement. Russia states that armed forces of the new NATO member-states do not meet requirements of the Treaty. From the other hand Western countries do not ratify the amendments to the document saying that Russia has not fulfilled its commitments to withdraw Russian troops from Georgia and Transdnestria. On Russia's initiative a conference was held on June in Vienna, where participants discussed the situation in the CFE agreement. Moscow offered to review the document but Western nations did not express support for that idea and the conference ended with no results.



In a statement, the Kremlin Press Office said the causes for suspending Russia's participation in the CFE agreement are exactly the above mentioned "extraordinary circumstances", which make Russia suspend his participation in the CFE agreement "until NATO member-states ratify the adapted version of the document and fulfill their commitments, the BBC Russian service reports.



For the first time Putin mentioned of such possibility in his annual message to the both chambers of the Russian Parliament April 26. He offered to suspend the CFE agreement until all European countries, including those which are NATO member-states ratify the adapted version of the document.



The treaty between Russian and NATO members was signed in 1990 and amended in 1999 to reflect changes since the breakup of the Soviet Union. It sets limits for the number of tanks, heavy artillery and combat aircraft, as well as troops, deployed in the region between the Atlantic Ocean and the Urals Mountains.