NATO, Russia Experts Particularize Initiatives For More Specific, Substantial Moscow-NATO Cooperation

Experts of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and Russia are elaborating particulars of joint initiatives intending deeper cooperation between them, said NATO Secretary General George Robertson at the Diplomatic Academy on Thursday. He recalled that during his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Brussels he passed to the Russian president a package of proposals on more concrete and substantial cooperation. According to him, Robertson proposed an intensive programme of joint exercises for deepening operative interaction in such areas as airlifting and mid-air refuelling. President Putin and the NATO secretary general discussed the possibility of creating an unofficial brain trust for exchange of opinion on ways of strengthening cooperation in the struggle against terrorism and prospects of relations between NATO and Russia, Robertson said.