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WORLD NEWS Monday 18 SepteMber 2017

NATO concerned about Russia’s transparency on military games

“We have high concentra- can best meet global se- stable and secure,” he said.
tion of troops in the Baltics. curity challenges. He also added there was
We have a high concentra- Stability and security in the no plan for reducing troops
tion of troops in the Black Western Balkan countries in Kosovo or setting a time
Sea and potential for an was also discussed during length for their presence.
incident may be quite high the conference. Pavel said Some 4,500 troops from
because of a human mis- trouble in the region could 31 countries have been
take, because of a tech- come from radicalism, or- deployed in Kosovo since
nology failure,” said Pavel ganized crime, migration, June 1999, after NATO’s 78-
said. “We have to be sure economic problems or the day air campaign to stop a
that such an unintended “malign influence from Rus- deadly Serbian crackdown
incident will not escalate sia.” against ethnic Albanian
into conflict.” “We do not compete with separatists. Kosovo de-
The Military Committee of- Russia for the Western Bal- clared independence from
fers consensus-based ad- kans. We are primarily fo- Serbia in 2008, but Serbia
vice on how the alliance cused on the Balkans being has not recognized it.q
In this photo taken on Thursday, Sept. 14, 2017, Belarus’ soldiers
aim their anti-aircraft gun at a training ground at an undisclosed
location in Belarus. Russia and Belarus began major war games
Thursday, an operation involving thousands of troops, tanks and
aircraft on NATO’s eastern edge practicing how to hunt down
and destroy armed spies, among other maneuvers.
(Vayar Military Agency photo via AP)
By LLAZAR SEMINI Moscow that “NATO is not
Associated Press considered as an enemy”
TIRANA, Albania (AP) — A and that “the exercise is
senior NATO official says not aimed at NATO,” Pav-
there’s reason to be con- el said Russians have not
cerned about the large- been transparent about
scale Zapad 2017 military the facts of the exercises.
maneuvers being con- He says the number of
ducted now by Russia and troops in the exercises —
Belarus, since they could which the Russians say is
be seen as “a serious prep- about 12,700 — could ac-
aration for big war.” tually be between 70,000
Gen. Petr Pavel, head of to 100,000.
NATO’s Military Committee, “All together, what we see
told the Associated Press in is a serious preparation for
an interview Saturday that big war,” he told The As-
NATO is increasing efforts sociated Press. “When we
to re-establish the military- only look at the exercise
to-military communications that is presented by Russia
with Russia to avoid any there should be no worry.
“unintended consequenc- But when we look it in the
es of potential incidents big picture, we have to be
during the exercise.” worried, because Russia
The defense chiefs of NATO was not transparent.”
member countries were Two weeks ago Pavel met
holding their annual con- in person with the Russian
ference this year in the Al- military’s General Staff,
banian capital of Tirana to Gen. Valery Gerasimov.
discuss fighting terrorism, The Supreme Allied Com-
the situation in the Western mander for Europe, Gen.
Balkans and the new U.S. Curtis Scaparrotti, had a
strategy on Afghanistan. phone call with Gerasimov
The Zapad war games, be- at the beginning of Zapad
ing conducted this year 17. Pavel said it was “main-
mostly in Belarus, run until ly focused on transparen-
Sept. 20 and reportedly cy and risk reduction and
involve 5,500 Russian and avoidance of unintended
7,200 Belarusian troops. consequences of potential
Despite assurances from incidents.”