Duma is opposed to NATO expansion: speaker

The State Duma, or the lower parliamentary house, does not welcome the Northern Alliance expansion, Duma Speaker Gennady Seleznyov said as meeting the head of the House of Commons Defence Committee, Bruce Thomas George, Tuesday.

Seleznyov assured that "a different system of international security will be created in the future".

In his turn, the British MP remarked that Russia and NATO countries would have to do a lot in order to improve their relations. He was hopeful that neither NATO itself, nor any of the NATO members, nor Russia would try to hinder the process.

At the meeting the Russian and British MPs also discussed the issue of restoring the Belarussian delegation to the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, the State Duma press service reports. According to Bruce Thomas George, there are no legal obstacles to Belarus' resitting at the OSCE PA table d'hote.

Current relations between State Duma committees and those of British parliament allow to have a direct discussion of most urgent issues, Gennady Seleznyov underlined in conclusion.