The incorporation of the Baltic states into NATO poses a direct threat to the security interests of Russia, the minister said at a meeting in Moscow with the head of the Norwegian Parliament's defense committee. "If events take such a course, the military infrastructure of NATO will come right to Russia's borders, while the Kaliningrad region will find itself surrounded by NATO," Sergeyev was quoted as saying by Leonid Ivashov, head of the Defense Ministry's international cooperation department.
"The defense minister clearly stated Russia's position on the unacceptability to Russia of the NATO expansion process. In turn, the Norwegian side referred to the right of every state to decide independently whether or not to enter the Euro-Atlantic Alliance," Ivashov told reporters after the meeting.
Russian authorities have always been fiercely opposed to NATO's enlargement into the Baltic states and Eastern Europe. Tension is likely to increase as the Baltic states prepare to join the Western Alliance.
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