PRAGUE, Czech Republic, March 21 (UPI) -- NATO Secretary General George Robertson on Thursday referred to Russia as the 20th member of the 19-member
alliance and said he is "optimistic" about ongoing talks with Moscow.
"Until now, our relationship with Russia has been conducted at '19 plus one,' " Robertson said. "Now, however, on a range of key issues, Russia will sit alongside the 19 allies as an equal partner.
"This forum for cooperation 'at 20' should be ready well before" the Prague summit in November, he said.
Robertson did not name the "key issues" or describe the current negotiations
between NATO and Russia, which began in December and include a format for giving the Kremlin some kind of voting power on the NATO council.
Currently Russia is one of 46 NATO "partner" countries, but the Putin government clearly signaled a desire for closer relations after mutual East-West interests emerged following Sept. 11 attack on New York and Washington.
Indeed, Putin lifted his country's longtime opposition to NATO enlargement in East Europe and expressed an interest in joining the alliance after he held discussed the fight against with President Bush in October. Since then, anti-West hardliners in Moscow have faded from the picture while key Russian
parliament and military leaders -- including Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov -- echoed Putin's resolve.
Nevertheless, the cooperative pact is still taking shape.
Questioned by a reporter from the Prague newspaper Pravda -- a left-wing daily and former communist propaganda sheet before the Iron Curtain fell in 1989 -- Robertson said negotiators are still hammering out a plan for assimilating Russia into NATO.
"We've not yet reached a final conclusion, either on the institution itself nor on the substance," he said. "But negotiations are ongoing, I remain optimistic, and I believe that there is genuine political will on both sides
to make this happen."
Russia and the NATO council are not complete strangers, as representatives from the two sides have been meeting since 1997. But Robertson said during the 1990s the two sides "danced nervously around each other" as the alliance's hopes for eastward enlargement became "a major bone of contention," with Russia viewing it as a "sinister geopolitical plot."
Even with a closer relationship as a "20th" member, Robertson said, Russia and other NATO allies do not expect to agree on every matter. He mentioned the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya, the scene of continuing civil conflict, as an issue of disagreement for the West and Moscow.
"All this does not mean that I harbor romantic expectations about NATO's relationship with Russia," Robertson said. "I do not expect Moscow to enthusiastically welcome NATO enlargement" which could add up to nine East Europe countries, from the Baltic to the Balkans, after the November summit.
But harsh distrust is being replaced with cooperation, Robertson said. "September 11 has created an entirely new context for NATO-Russia relations," he said.
The NATO chief told the 300 students at a university lecture hall that Putin's state visit last year to Poland -- which joined NATO in 1999 -- was a snapshot of the changing times. The Russian president then told Warsaw leaders that their relationship with his government mirrored his view toward
NATO: Skeptical, perhaps, but willing to work things out.
The Warsaw meeting was an about-face from the "resentment" felt by former Russian President Boris Yeltsin toward Poland's NATO entry a few years earlier, Robertson said. "It was resentment, but it was eventually accepted," he said.
Now, the NATO-Russian initiative "gives us the chance to transform the strategic landscape, to finally get the kind of practical, pragmatic NATO-Russia relationship we should have achieved a long time ago."
Though his exact role remains uncertain, Putin is expected to join ministers
from the NATO countries at the Prague conference. His scheduled appearance is one reason Robertson is calling the gathering a "transformation summit."