BRUSSELS (AFP) Oct 28, 2003
NATO chief George Robertson is to invite Russian President Vladimir Putin for talks on the sidelines of a summit next year at which NATO will enact its expansion into ex-Soviet Europe, officials said Tuesday.
Russia is long opposed to the Alliance's enlargement to include seven of Moscow's former satellite states, but finally resigned itself to the NATO decision taken at at a landmark summit in Prague in November 2002.
Leaders of the 19-member alliance will meet in Istanbul next spring for a summit expected to welcome in the new members: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
Robertson said he plans to invite Putin for a summit session of the NATO-Russia Council, a body set up in May 2002 to embody its increasingly close relations with Moscow, made all the more closer by September 11, 2001.
Robertson, who is to step down in December handing over to Jaap De Hoop Scheffer, the current Dutch foreign minister, is due to travel to Moscow on Thursday and Friday for a "farewell" trip to the Russians.
During the trip he plans to "invite president Putin to participate in a summit meeting of the Nato-Russia Council in Istanbul next spring," said a NATO official, requesting anomymity, adding that dates and details had yet to be fixed.
Robertson will also discuss preparations for upcoming meetings of NATO defence and foreign ministers, scheduled in Brussels at the start of December, said the official.
Robertson also plans to broach "areas in which early follow-up will be required with" his Dutch successor, including the Alliance's involvement in current hotspots Afghanistan and Iraq, he said.
NATO chief George Robertson is to invite Russian President Vladimir Putin for talks on the sidelines of a summit next year at which NATO will enact its expansion into ex-Soviet Europe, officials said Tuesday.
Russia is long opposed to the Alliance's enlargement to include seven of Moscow's former satellite states, but finally resigned itself to the NATO decision taken at at a landmark summit in Prague in November 2002.
Leaders of the 19-member alliance will meet in Istanbul next spring for a summit expected to welcome in the new members: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
Robertson said he plans to invite Putin for a summit session of the NATO-Russia Council, a body set up in May 2002 to embody its increasingly close relations with Moscow, made all the more closer by September 11, 2001.
Robertson, who is to step down in December handing over to Jaap De Hoop Scheffer, the current Dutch foreign minister, is due to travel to Moscow on Thursday and Friday for a "farewell" trip to the Russians.
During the trip he plans to "invite president Putin to participate in a summit meeting of the Nato-Russia Council in Istanbul next spring," said a NATO official, requesting anomymity, adding that dates and details had yet to be fixed.
Robertson will also discuss preparations for upcoming meetings of NATO defence and foreign ministers, scheduled in Brussels at the start of December, said the official.
Robertson also plans to broach "areas in which early follow-up will be required with" his Dutch successor, including the Alliance's involvement in current hotspots Afghanistan and Iraq, he said.
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