Excerpt from report by international stream of Gazprom-owned Russian NTV on 28 July
[Presenter] Senior NATO officials learnt today how Russia would go about its foreign policy, and what a new agreement on European security could look like. The relevant documents were presented at a Russia-NATO Council meeting by [Russian permanent representative at NATO] Dmitriy Rogozin. Sergey Kholoshevskiy has studied the reaction of the alliance at the HQ of the erstwhile likeliest potential enemy [standard Soviet-era reference to NATO].
[Correspondent] Russian representative at the alliance Dmitriy Rogozin said in Brussels today that Russia suggested to NATO that a new European security agreement be concluded. The document would be legally binding and, most importantly - this is the Russian side's condition - it would be based on the UN Charter.
[Dmitriy Rogozin, speaking in his office] What we suggest is sort of reloading our relations because on many matters our contacts have reached a definite dead end. This is why our NATO colleagues were very interested in this. It will become clear soon whether they are ready for a substantive discussion, of a serious and philosophical kind, or are going to stick to narrow selfish bloc-based interests.
[Correspondent] The need to create new security architecture in Europe was spoken about by [President] Dmitriy Medvedev in Berlin back in June. Russia suggests to NATO that a broad security pact be concluded, whose participants could also include, for example, China, India and Central Asian states. It will be a more global association, in which the OSCE, NATO, the EU, the Commonwealth of Independent States and the Collective Security Treaty Organization would participate.
As regards NATO, it has long been said in Europe that the alliance needs reforms. There is, however, no answer yet to the question of how to go about these reforms. NATO officials themselves do not want to lose their jobs: they will never agree to the abolition of this morally obsolete organization. [Passage omitted]
Russia's latest proposals are unlikely to be enthusiastically welcomed by NATO. Here, they find it very hard indeed to give up stereotypes. Even the discussion of Moscow's initiatives, however, is already a major step forward for sluggish NATO officials.
Originally published by NTV Mir, Moscow, in Russian 1840 28 Jul 08.
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Story Source: BBC Monitoring Former Soviet Union