NOVO-OGARYOVO, October 15 (RIA Novosti) - U.S. State Secretary Condoleezza Rice confirmed at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin that the United States had no plans to deploy new bases in Central Asia, except the one in Manas (Kyrgyzstan), Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday. "The Manas base is designed to ensure the completion of the anti-terrorist operation in Afghanistan," Lavrov quoted Rice as saying.
The minister said Russia and the United States "had no disagreements" on the matter. "There are no other objectives than to eliminate the terrorist threat, stop drug trafficking, facilitate the development of states in the region, and achieve normalization in Afghanistan," Lavrov said.
"There were no changes," he said responding to the question whether Rice had made any new statements on U.S. policy in Central Asia.
