RUSSIA/US: US Secretary of State Mr Colin Powell urged Russia yesterday not to feel threatened by the men and military hardware that Washington intends to station in the former Soviet bloc.
At the end of a two-day visit to Moscow that saw Mr Powell mingle unusually robust criticism of the Kremlin with assurances of enduring friendship, Washington's senior diplomat said it was time to shed a staid Cold War mentality. "We may want to put some temporary facilities in some of the countries that used to be part of the Warsaw Pact," Mr Powell said.
"But it is not essentially moving our army closer to the Russian Federation and people should not see it in that light."
He said Washington would use the outposts "to get to dangerous places, crisis places in Central Asia, the Persian Gulf, the Middle East".
Moscow is already irked by a lingering US presence in ex-Soviet Central Asia, where they established bases after the September 11th attacks to oust the Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan.It is also wary of growing US interest in the Caucasus, where Mr Powell attended Sunday's inauguration of Georgia's new president, Mr Mikhail Saakashvili. He backed Mr Saakashvili's demand that Russia close its last two military bases in the country, and even offered US cash to speed the withdrawal.
After saying it would take a decade to remove its troops, Moscow pledged during Mr Powell's visit to reopen negotiations with Georgia in search of a "mutually acceptable" solution.
Mr Powell, in turn, assured Russia that US troops training the Georgian military would soon complete their work and leave a country that Moscow still considers to be firmly within its sphere of influence.
President Vladimir Putin exchanged pledges of friendship and co-operation with Mr Powell on Monday, after Russian diplomats were stung by the American's forthright article in Izvestia newspaper. "Certain developments in Russian politics and foreign policy in recent months have given us pause," he wrote. "Political power is not yet fully tethered to the law."
"Key aspects of civil society - free media and political party development for example - have not sustained an independent presence," Mr Powell went on, while questioning "certain aspects" of Russian policy in Chechnya, where a second war in a decade with separatist rebels shows no signs of ending.