Updated 3:31 p.m. Moscow Time
MOSCOW, September 12 (RIA Novosti) – Moscow is seriously concerned by NATO's activities in the Black and Baltic seas, Russia’s envoy to the alliance, Alexander Grushko, said Friday.
The military presence of non-littoral states in the Black Sea will cause "a substantial shift in the strategic and regional balance and, naturally, we will have to think of how to parry and neutralize possible threats," Grushko said during the Moscow-Brussels video-linkup hosted by news agency Rossiya Segodnya.
"Same with the Baltic Sea," he added.
He said Moscow would closely study last week's decisions made at a NATO summit in Wales decisions with regard to domestic security.
"It all will be a subject of most attentive study by all Russian state institutions concerned, first of all with regard to measures that we need to take to ensure our security," he said.
The military alliance has previously violated the provisions of the Russia-NATO Founding Act, Grushko said, referring in particular to the establishment of NATO bases in Romania, Bulgaria and Poland.
"The Founding Act includes a very clear provision that NATO countries will refrain from additional deployment of the existing combat forces on a permanent basis," he added.
"The base that is now being built in Romania, of course, is a serious challenge to the security of the Russian Federation, and we consider that this is a significant violation of the related commitments," he said.
NATO has also been ratcheting up its presence near Russia's borders, citing the need to better defend its allies. The alliance intensified its air patrols in Baltic states, deployed AWACS surveillance planes over Poland and Romania and sent its warships to the Black and Mediterranean seas.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday the crisis in eastern Ukraine, which has been provoked by the West, has mainly been used to resuscitate NATO.
