The Russian Foreign Ministry published the draft agreement on security guarantees proposed by Moscow to the US and NATO.

On Wednesday, at the meeting between RussianDeputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and US Deputy Secretary of State Karen Donfried, two documents – a treaty and an agreement containingRussian demands for security guarantees – were presented and handed over to the Americans.

Moscow noted its readiness to start negotiations as soon as possible.

Insisting on the development of security guarantees, Russia presented a comprehensive proposal for legal security guarantees in preparation for a new round of dialogue on strategic stability with the United States.

Russia rules out any enlargement of NATO to the East and even demands that no additional military forces and weapons systems be deployed in countries that once belonged to the Warsaw Pact and have now joined NATO(i. e. Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Albania, Skopje).

Moscow is even demanding the cessation of all US activity in Rimland (the protective “ring” of Eurasia).

In short, it asks the US to stop any aggressive action against Russia by accepting a multipolar world in which the US will no longer have primacy.

The Russian Foreign Ministry had noted that they expected the alliance to react to the demands made, otherwise a new round of confrontation could ensue.

The draft agreements published today and revealed by defencenet. ru contain the following requirements for the first document:

He rules out further NATO expansion and the accession of Ukraine to the alliance

Not to deploy additional military forces and weapons outside the countries where there was already a NATO presence in May 1997 (before the EasternEuropean countries joined the alliance) – except in exceptional circumstances with the consent ofRussia and NATO members

NATO should abandon all military activity in Ukraine, Eastern Europe, Transcaucasia, and Central Asia.

Do not deploy medium and short-range missiles that can hit the other side‘s territory

Not to conduct exercises and other activities with more than one brigade in the agreed border zone and to exchange information on military exercises regularly

The United States to commit itself to exclude further eastward expansion of NATO and to refuse to admit post-Soviet countries to the alliance

The United States to undertake commitments not to establish military bases in post-Soviet countries, not to use their military infrastructure and not to develop military cooperation with them.

The document shall enter into force on the date of receipt of written confirmation that the Parties have completed the necessary procedures.

The document was written in Russian and English, and both texts are equally valid, RIA Novosti reports.

Russian President Vladimir Putin previously stated the need to immediately start negotiations to conclude clear international legal agreements that exclude any further NATO advances to the east and the deployment of weapons threatening Russia in neighbouring states, notably Ukraine.

Moscow stresses the demand to formally renounce the decision of the NATO Bucharest Summit in 2008 that Ukraine and Georgia will become NATO members.

It is noted that this decision is considered tocontradict the obligation of the leaders of all OSCEparticipatingstates not to strengthen their securityat the expense of the security of others.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov believes that relations between Russia and the United States have reached a “dangerous line“:

“In circumstances where our relations have reached a dangerous tipping point due to Washington‘s culpability, it is urgent to take concrete measures to reduce the degree of confrontation.”

Our assessment is that these demands will not be accepted, except perhaps some of them concerning the further enlargement of NATO to the East.