Russia demands NATO’s refusal to further expand be documented

Moscow is not satisfied with verbal assurances that NATO will not expand eastward and insists on documenting the alliance’s refusal to further expand.

This was stated by Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov in an interview with Russia’s Channel One.

“Of course, such important words (verbal assurances of non-expansion — Ed.) must be followed by actions to document NATO’s non-expansion,” the Kremlin spokesman said.

He added that back in the times of Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin, Russia was promised that NATO did not intend to expand eastward, but the alliance subsequently expanded eastward five or six times and continued to admit new members.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, after yesterday’s meeting with Donald Trump’s representatives Steven Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Ireland, demanded Ukraine’s membership in NATO as part of future agreements on European security.

“If we are in NATO, that will be one security architecture. Everyone will be very happy if we end up in NATO,” the Ukrainian president said.