Not dissolving NATO post-Cold War seen as mistake by many — Lavrov

MOSCOW:  Many experts believe that the NATO bloc should have been dissolved after the USSR collapsed and the Warsaw Pact was terminated, Rus...

MOSCOW:  Many experts believe that the NATO bloc should have been dissolved after the USSR collapsed and the Warsaw Pact was terminated, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a meeting with the heads of foreign embassies on the Ukrainian settlement.

"Today, many historians and political scientists in the West express the point of view that their colleagues have been declaring for many, many years, maybe even decades. This is the fact that when the Warsaw Pact ceased to exist, when the Soviet Union extended its hand for unification with Europe, the US and the West as a whole on the basis of equality, mutual benefits and respect, no one dissolved NATO. And actually no one planned to," the minister said.

Lavrov noted that "just yesterday, a famous US economist, political scientist Jeffrey Sachs, cited this mistake in an interview with [US journalist] Tucker Carlson." "This was not done. Now, we can confidently say that the irresistible desire of the US to retain control of Europe through NATO was the reason," the minister said.

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