May 29, 2002	Wednesday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 16,1423

PRATICA DI MARE (Italy), May 28: Russia and Nato created a new forum for security cooperation on Tuesday at a landmark ceremony outside Rome, building on the foundations of their sometimes stormy relationship over the past decade.

The new Nato-Russia Council will give Russia an equal voice with the 19 member states on key European security issues from the fight against terrorism to preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction, search and rescue and peacekeeping.

The new body is designed to draw Russia ever closer into Western security structures and help end Russia’s reputation as a broody, unreliable partner on the fringes of Europe.

Relations between Russia and the Atlantic alliance have had a bouncy ride since the demise of the Soviet Union.

In 1994, Russia joined the Partnership for Peace programme designed to boost security cooperation between Nato and other nations, including former communist states queuing up to join the alliance.

However, Russia demanded a special relationship with the alliance to better reflect its status as a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council and the second most powerful nuclear state after the United States.

It bitterly fought the eastward expansion of Nato into the former Soviet bloc, and only dropped its opposition with the creation in 1997 of the Permanent Joint Council, designed to give Russia a voice — but not a veto — in the affairs of the world’s premier military alliance.

Signed in Paris in May of that year, the “Founding Act” was followed in March 1998 by the creation of a Russian military mission at Nato headquarters, staffed by a senior general.

Despite occasional tensions over political differences between Moscow and Alliance members, troops from the former foes established what all sides say was a good working relationship on the ground, peacekeepers working side-by-side in Bosnia and later in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo.

Indeed, it was Russian paratroopers who dashed from Bosnia to secure control of Kosovo’s main Pristina airport before the arrival of British troops. The unusually bold Russian move caused consternation at first in the alliance and the British commander disobeyed an order from the top US Nato commander in Europe to head the Russians off.

Although diplomatic pressure prevented Russia gaining airspace to send in reinforcements, the dash guaranteed Moscow’s forces a presence in Kosovo, although Nato refused to give the pro-Serb Russians command of one of the zones into which the province was divided.

Western military officials say, however, the two sides have established a good working relationship, and praise the quality of Russian mine-clearing efforts in the province.

Nato’s Kosovo operation initially caused uproar in Moscow, and President Boris Yeltsin broke off ties, kicked out the Nato representative to Russia and halted all cooperation.

But an ice-breaking visit by the new Nato Secretary-General George Robertson in February last year heralded a thaw in relations.

However, it was current Russian President Vladimir Putin’s stalwart support for the U.S. “war on terrorism” that paved the way for a breakthrough in relations.

Tuesday’s creation of the Russia-Nato Council is the Kremlin leader’s reward for his pro-Western policy through which the former KGB spy seeks to anchor his vast and economically backward state firmly at the heart of European institutions.—Reuters