Martin Butcher and Nicola Butler

By Martin Butcher and Nicola Butler, December 2007

Summary

The NATO Foreign Ministers' meetings on December 7, 2007, have taken place against a backdrop of deteriorating relations between the US and Russia, an impending crisis over the status of Kosovo, and NATO facing increasingly difficult conditions in Afghanistan with an operation currently underway to take back the town of Musa Qala in Helmand Province from the Taliban.

Within days of the meeting Russia announced it is proceeding with its intention to "suspend" implementation of the 1987 Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty, although it is reportedly prepared to continue negotiations on the future of the Treaty. There are no indications as yet that Russia is redeploying weapons covered by the CFE, but Moscow has stopped exchanging information stipulated by the Treaty and receiving foreign inspectors to verify Treaty implementation.

NATO officials are eager to portray NATO moving from being a territorial defence organisation to being a global security provider or enabler. Other issues of concern raised at the meeting included Kosovo and the continuing war in Afghanistan. NATO also welcomed the Annapolis Conference and the potential for further negotiations towards peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

With NATO facing crisis in Kosovo, and the continuing war in Afghanistan, the possibility of becoming entangled in the Middle East peace process would give even the most ambitious NATO Minister pause for thought. It is questionable whether public opinion in Europe would stand for the current process of dialogue with Mediterranean partners being transformed into active military engagement in the intractable problems of the Middle East.

The December 2007 Foreign Ministers's meetings promised to be difficult for NATO, and so it proved. None of the major issues addressed have actually been resolved, and since the meeting Russia has taken further steps to suspend the CFE Treaty. The only positive aspect is that at least NATO and Russia are able to continue talking - for the moment. The decision by NATO to maintain troops in Kosovo indefinitely will, at least, keep the lid on the situation there. If the NATO-Russia relationship is not to deteriorate significantly, then urgent action is needed to restore the CFE Treaty and to build bridges again between Washington, Brussels and Moscow.

The unilateral approach of the Bush administration, combined with the increasingly authoritarian tendencies of President Putin and his United Russia Party are threatening to put the past ten years of slow construction of a positive relationship between NATO and Russia into reverse. It remains to be seen whether this decline can be halted after the US Presidential elections in 2008.

Russia suspends implementation of CFE