Insisting on eradicating the "root causes of war", Russia reiterates NATO's return to the 1997 border

According to internal Russian documents obtained by The New York Times, Russian President Vladimir Putin insists that NATO end its military activities in Eastern Europe.

Internal Russian documents obtained by the New York Times revealed that Moscow’s ambition to reshape Europe’s security landscape through the Ukraine-Russia war has not changed. It reiterated its pre-conflict claims and demanded that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) withdraw its military deployments and activities in Eastern Europe.

NATO expanded significantly to Eastern Europe after 1997, including Poland, the three Baltic countries that directly border Russia, and Finland, which will join in 2023. Moscow demanded in December 2021 that NATO countries cease expansion of their territory and any military operations in Ukraine, Eastern Europe, the South Caucasus and Central Asia. The document, dated November 10 and circulated among Russian officials in recent days, shows that more than four years of bloody conflict have not shaken Russian President Vladimir Putin's core goal of eradicating the "root causes of war."

Not only that, the security requirements put forward by Russia at the time included NATO giving up the nuclear umbrella mechanism that gave the United States the ability to deploy nuclear weapons in Europe. In the latest document, Russia wants to further rule out the possibility of nuclear-armed countries France and the United Kingdom using nuclear weapons to protect other European countries. Regarding Ukraine, it seeks to end the supply of any type of Western weapons, military equipment and products to Kyiv, and to set prerequisites for Ukraine to join the European Union, on the condition that it will not participate in the organization's common defense policy.