Russian navy says pulling out of NATO exercise

Aug 19, 2008 MOSCOW (Agencies)
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Showdown over Georgia crisis escalates
Russian navy says pulling out of NATO exercise

Russia on Tuesday hit back at western powers’ attempts to punish it for invading its tiny neighbor Georgia, calling NATO statement over the conflict “biased”, as its navy said it was pulling out of a NATO exercise in the Baltic Sea and was unable to host a scheduled visit by a U.S. naval frigate.

"The (NATO) declaration above all appears unobjective and biased because there's not a word about how all this started, why it happened, who started the aggressive action and who armed Georgia," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said at a press conference called in response to the NATO statement.

He referred to a statement by NATO foreign ministers in Brussels that condemned Russian military action as "disproportionate and inconsistent" with Moscow's peacekeeping role and said the alliance could not carry on "business as usual" with Moscow.

"It appears to me that NATO is trying to portray the aggressor as the victim, to whitewash a criminal regime and to save a failing regime" in Georgia, Lavrov said.

He also condemned the alliance's encouragement of Georgia's NATO membership bid.

"The policy of drawing Georgian into NATO is not about Georgia corresponding with NATO standards but is dictated exclusively by aims that are nothing other than anti-Russian, aimed at nothing other than supporting an aggressive regime," Lavrov said.

Meanwhile, a Russian naval spokesman told AFP "Minesweepers of the Baltic fleet will not participate in the Open Spirit 2008 international naval exercise in Baltic Sea waters”.

He added that it was currently "not considered possible" to host the U.S. naval frigate Ford.

Open Spirit is an international naval exercise held annually under the NATO "Partnership for Peace" program aimed at ridding Baltic waters of masses of unexploded ordnance left over from World War I, World War II and the Cold War.

The USS Ford was due to visit Russia's eastern port of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, home to Russia's Pacific fleet, on September 5-9, RIA Novosti reported.

The Open Spirit exercise was due to start later this month.

Last week the United States announced it was canceling two military exercises with Russia.

"The (NATO) declaration above all appears unobjective and biased," Lavrov said.

Source: http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2008/08/19/55108.html