ITAR-TASS: CSTO ready to give special status to Ukraine, consider its entry

ITAR-TASS: CSTO ready to give special status to Ukraine, consider its entry

CSTO ready to give special status to Ukraine, consider its entry

23.09.2010, 13.03

NEW YORK, September 23 (Itar-Tass) - The Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) is ready to grant a special status to Ukraine and consider, if need be, the issue of its admission to the organisation, CSTO Secretary General Nikolai Bordyuzha told Itar-Tass in an interview.

“We are ready to more closely cooperate with Ukraine on security matters,” he noted. “Moreover, if the Ukrainian side is ready we can decide on granting it a special status in the CSTO.” “This is useful, and I believe that it is an objective necessity, because states located in the post-Soviet space are facing one and the same problems,” the CSTO secretary general explained. “In order to settle them we can together take corresponding measures, even without speaking about Ukraine’s admission to the CSTO,” he said.

As for the possible admission, Bordyuzha noted that “this is an absolutely voluntary matter, and if Ukraine sometimes considers it necessary to do this then it will openly say this.” “In this case we have developed the admission procedure and the whole regulatory framework,” he noted. “But for this it should express the desire.” “Ukraine is a sovereign state and it decides on its own in which security system it wants to be – with us, CSTO, with NATO of somewhere else,” Bordyuzha added.

He also said that this December Belarus will assume the CSTO rotating presidency. “We expect very serious progress from this in the formation of the collective security system,” the official stressed. “Belarus is traditionally a very active and creative member of our organisation and it always puts forward interesting initiatives and projects,” he added. “Generally, it is very easy to work with Belarus, because its leadership is oriented for the result and practical work and to a lesser degree – for usual declarations,” Bordyuzha pointed out.

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