Putin: CSTO will respond to NATO expansion

On May 16th, Russian President Vladimir Putin stressed that the CSTO countries will respond appropriately to NATO expansion and will continue to stand up to attempts to rewrite history and glorify neo-Nazism.  

“NATO has deviated from its mission in its geographical framework and is trying in a bad way to influence other regions,” Putin said during a summit of the organization’s leaders in Moscow. 

Putin added: “Russia does not have problems with Finland and Sweden, and this means that the expansion of NATO through these countries does not create a direct threat to Russia, but the expansion of military infrastructure in these areas will certainly lead to retaliatory measures, based on the threats that will arise for us.” 

Putin explained that the American biological laboratories on Ukrainian soil were mainly developing biological weapons and their task was to collect biological materials and study the peculiarities of the spread of viruses and dangerous diseases for their own purposes. 

Putin said: “We have long heard the alarm about the biological activities of the United States of America in the post-Soviet space.. Russia, in the course of the special military operation, obtained documented evidence that biological weapons components were created mainly in areas immediately adjacent to its borders.” 

He pointed out that all this is accompanied by an unprecedented rush towards russophobia, the frenzied russophobia there, in the so-called civilized and politically conscious countries in the West. 

Putin revealed the intention of the member states of the organization to sign a joint declaration of cooperation in the military and defense fields, to expand coordination internationally, and to conduct extensive exercises this year. 

Putin called for granting the CIS observer status in the organization, saying: We must expand interaction with our natural partners in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the Commonwealth of Independent States.

The CSTO currently includes Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

O. al-Mohammad