ISTANBUL, June 20. /TASS/. Russia strives to unite the countries of the Global South as a counterbalance to NATO in view of the so-called conflict atmosphere growing worldwide and the new arms race, Huseyin Bagci, president of Turkey’s Foreign Policy Institute, said.

"The world in general has entered the large-scale arms race process, and it is being noted more frequently that it is rapidly entering a so-called conflict atmosphere. NATO remains the largest military bloc.<…> Russia is trying to unite the Global South countries. It will not enter the arms race with NATO alone, proceeding from its own economic considerations," he told the Sozcu newspaper.

In his opinion, the fact that eight countries among those who participated in the conference on Ukraine held in Burgenstock, Switzerland, on June 15-16, took Russia’s side, can be viewed as "a sign for creating a new global Moscow treaty" to replace the Warsaw Pact formed by the military union of Europe’s socialist countries during the Cold War. This organization existed from 1955 until 1991.

The expert reiterated that during the Cold War, the Soviet Union was developing military cooperation with China and North Korea. "Military cooperation with them will most likely expand. It is quite natural that this will worry NATO," Bagci said.

He does not rule out that NATO’s new secretary general, former Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte, expected to replace Jens Stoltenberg, will toughen rhetoric against China. However, "tensions in NATO-China relations over policy with regard to Ukraine will destabilize the region even more," the expert added." "Changing China’s policy seems tough. China will continue to cooperate with Russia as well as with [other] BRICS countries," Bagci concluded.