madam president anders fogh rasmussen secretary-general of nato stated that the nato-russia council summit which took place in lisbon provided a historic impulse to improving nato-russia relations which i very much welcome
although the nato-russia council heads of state and government agreed on a joint ballistic missile threat assessment and decided to resume missile defence cooperation president medvedev announced after the summit that russia will take part in the envisaged joint missile defence system only as an equal and fully fledged partner involved in information exchange and resolving whatever problems
i would like to point out that equal partners must take equal responsibilities
there are some significant differences between nato and russia when defining security
while russia perceives classical military threats to security nato on the other hand emphasises the lack of democracy and violation of human rights as a security threat
in order for russia to be more closely involved in joint projects within the framework of nato i would expect russia to mainstream democracy human rights civil liberties and the rule of law
to have an equal partnership nato and russia must be on an equal footing on such relevant issues
