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In follow-up comments, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday that he expects U.S.-Russian ties to improve and called for stronger cooperation on global security issues, according to an interview released by the ITAR-Tass news agency.
Russia and the United States are "allies in countering terrorism and the threats associated with it," he said. "At the level of our leaders, there is full awareness that we must be together by all means in the struggle against this enemy."
However, Lavrov also said Washington should not apply "double standards" in its identification of terrorists and
urged the United States to be more open about its military presence near Russian borders.
Lavrov called on the United States to be upfront about the possible redeployment of its forces closer to Russia's borders.
"The most important issue is strategic stability as a whole, especially as NATO is enlarging and the U.S. military presence abroad is being reconfigured," Lavrov said. "We need clarity in our relations with the Americans because our country's security depends on it." http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-russia-putin-governors,0,7148646.story?coll=sns-ap-nationworld-headlines There it is.