VIENNA (Sputnik) – Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that there were no specific developments yet on the format of Russian President Vladimir Putin's meeting with US President Donald Trump at the G20 summit next month.
"Many contradictions and lack of mutual understanding has piled up between Russia and the bloc, so clearing the backlog created in these years is a rather long process. So even if some issues will be discussed at a high level between the countries, they will most likely concern crisis situations such as Syria and North Korea," Andrey Kelin told reporters when asked whether the talks could defuse the situation between Russia and NATO.
Earlier, both Russian and US administrations said that the two leaders might meet on the sidelines of G20, however, no confirmation of such a meeting has been announced. The G20 summit will be held in the German city of Hamburg on July 7-8.
When commenting on the prospects of the meeting, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov previously said that it "will undoubtedly be expected to deliver specific results."
Military-to-military dialogue within the NATO-Russia Council needs to be restored to alleviate tensions in Europe, Kelin added.
Andrey Kelin pointed at the OSCE Annual Security Review Conference in Vienna to US military deployment and the doubling of NATO exercises in Europe, in addition to missile defense-building.
"We believe we need to use all available tools for a detente. We need to resume Russia-NATO Council dialogue with the participation of the military," Kelin said.
Russia will respond to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) future reinforcement on its borders, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Department of European Cooperation said.
"Naturally," Andrey Kelin said when asked whether Moscow would respond to NATO's possible moves in the eastern flank.
Kelin warned that heavy equipment depots in the Netherlands and German, in addition to one set to be constructed in Poland, "are being done so that everything is prepared in the event of the deployment of new brigades."
"Infrastructure is now being created for deployment, meaning that the deployment themselves will follow," he said.
