Russia and NATO to resume informal talks
10/12/2008 13:09 BRUSSELS, December 10 (RIA Novosti) - An informal meeting between NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and Russia's NATO envoy, Dmitry Rogozin, is planned for next week, Moscow's mission to the alliance said on Wednesday.
The Russian mission said the meeting is due to take place on December 18, while a NATO official told RIA Novosti that "a meeting may take place next week."
The foreign ministers of NATO's 26 member-states last week handed Scheffer a mandate to resume informal contacts between Russia and NATO after the alliance cut off ties because of the August conflict with Georgia, which began when Georgian forces attacked its breakaway republic of South Ossetia.
Speaking after the meeting of NATO foreign ministers on December 2, Scheffer said: "The allies agreed on what I would qualify as a conditional and graduated reengagement with Russia."
Rogozin has said that an informal NATO-Russia Council meeting could be held before the end of the month.
NATO called Russia's military response to Georgia's attack on South Ossetia "disproportionate" and condemned Moscow's decision in late August to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia, another breakaway province, as independent states.
In response to NATO's decision to halt cooperation, Russia froze a number of programs, including the Partnership for Peace program, halted cooperation with NATO's Moscow office and called off the NATO chief's visit to Moscow. Russia also canceled all joint-NATO naval training, including NATO visits to Russian ports.
Russia has not halted work with NATO in regard to arms control or cooperation in air space and the war in Afghanistan.
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