Russian Draft Security Pact on US-NATO

In News

• Recently, Russia drafted a pact to limit the U.S. and  NATO role in ex-Soviet nations.

About

• Russia published security proposals addressed to NATO and the United States.
• Russia called for urgent talks with Washington as tensions between Moscow and Western capitals soar over the conflict in Ukraine.

Russia’s stand

• NATO must not allow any new members to the U.S.-led military alliance and called for no new military bases to be established in ex-Soviet countries.
• The publication of the draft agreements — an unusual step in international diplomacy — comes at a tense moment in Russia’s ties with the West.
• Russia blames NATO for the rise in tensions, demanding “legal guarantees” the alliance won’t expand eastwards.
• It called for limits on the deployment of missiles and said that NATO members should “commit themselves to refrain from further enlargement” of the group.

West’s stand

• The West has accused Moscow of preparing an imminent invasion, claiming Russia has deployed tens of thousands of troops along Ukraine’s borders.
• The U.S. pushed back at the Russian proposals, saying it would not negotiate without Europe’s input.

Reasons of the Issue

• Latest: 
  • Intelligence Reports say Russia has moved 70,000 troops to its border with Ukraine and is preparing for a possible invasion early next year. 
  • Moscow denies any intention to attack and accuses Ukraine of planning an offensive to reclaim control of rebel-held eastern Ukraine.
• Background: 
  • Fighting between Ukrainian forces and Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine began after Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula. 
  • It has killed over 14,000 people and devastated Ukraine’s industrial heartland, known as the Donbas.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 1949

• Established in: 1949
• Headquarters: Brussels, Belgium
• India is not a member country of NATO.
• It is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 countries across the world including the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations to provide collective security against the Soviet Union.
• Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic joined NATO in 1999, followed in 2004 by Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and the former Soviet republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. In the following years, Albania, Croatia, Montenegro and North Macedonia also became members, bringing NATO membership to 30 nations.

Image Courtesy: NATO 

Warsaw Pact

• Warsaw Pact, formally Warsaw Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance, (May 14, 1955–July 1, 1991) treaty establishing a mutual-defense organization (Warsaw Treaty Organization).
• It composed originally of the Soviet Union and Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. (Albania withdrew in 1968, and East Germany did so in 1990.) 
• The treaty (which was renewed on April 26, 1985) provided for a unified military command and for the maintenance of Soviet military units on the territories of the other participating states.
• Immediate reason of formation of Agreement: 
  • The Paris agreement among the Western powers admitting West Germany to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. 
  • The Warsaw Pact was, however, the first step in a more systematic plan to strengthen the Soviet hold over its satellites. 
  • The treaty also served as a lever to enhance the bargaining position of the Soviet Union in international diplomacy, an inference that may be drawn by the concluding article of the treaty, which stipulated that the Warsaw agreement would lapse when a general East-West collective-security pact should come into force.
• The decades-long confrontation between eastern and western Europe was formally rejected by members of the Warsaw Pact, all of which, with the exception of the Soviet successor state of Russia, subsequently joined NATO.

Way Ahead

• Moscow and the alliance should work to “prevent incidents” in the Baltics and the Black Sea region
• A telephone hotline should be established for “emergency contacts”.
• International cooperation is needed to solve the ever-increasing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
• Both the countries should restrain from any move leading to escalation of the tension.

Source: TH