The Russian Foreign Ministry pointed to the lack of a foundation for negotiations with the West.

At the moment, there is no acceptable military-political foundation for creating a security dialogue between Russia and the West. This was announced on May 19 by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov.

"The main thing is that at the moment there are basically no conditions for launching a substantive, equitable and mutually acceptable strategic dialogue <...> There is simply no proper political and military-political foundation for this," he said in an interview with TASS.

He added that in order to reach agreements that would suit everyone, the West and, in particular, NATO need to stop confrontational steps and start taking into account Moscow's fundamental strategic interests. Only in this case, according to the deputy head of the diplomatic department, is it possible for Russia to return to a fruitful dialogue with the West on security issues.

Cold wave: The West is working on deterring Russia in the Baltic

This scenario is already being repeated in the Arctic region.

On the same day, Ryabkov said that the strategic risks of a "head-on clash" between NATO and Russia were increasing, and its consequences would be catastrophic. The Deputy Foreign Minister also noted that the narrative of the "growing Russian threat", recently spread in the European Union (EU), only fuels the situation.