TOKYO (Sputnik) – The non-regional North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) vessels’ presence in the Black Sea does not promote security and is taken into account in Russia’s military planning, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Director of the Department for Nonproliferation and Arms Control Mikhail Ulyanov said Friday.
“As for the extra-regional NATO presence in the Black Sea, this is factor that is not conducive to the strengthening of security and is of course taken into account in [Russia’s] military planning,” Ulyanov told RIA Novosti.
The naval phase of the US-led multinational Sea Breeze 2016 drills began Sunday near the southern Ukrainian city of Odesa, with the US Navy’s USS Ross Aegis-carrying guided missile destroyer and the USS Whidbey Island dock landing ship entering its ports.
