NATO, Russia to resume military ties

CORFU, Greece (AP) — NATO and Russia agreed to resume military ties Saturday in their first high- level meeting since Russia’s war with Georgia disrupted their relations 10 months ago.

NATO’s outgoing Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer announced that the so-called NATO-Russia Council, a panel set up in 2002 to improve ties between the former Cold War rivals, was operational again.

“It was my ambition to leave to my successor an NRC that is up and running,” said de Hoop Scheffer, whose term as secretary-general ends Aug. 1.

“After the meeting which just ended, I have achieved that aim. Because there was clearly a sense in that meeting that the NRC, which had been in neutral ... is now back in gear,” he said. “We also agreed to restart the military-to-military contacts.”

Relations between the alliance and the Russian military were frozen after the five-day Georgian war last August. Although political ties have thawed considerably over the past five months, there had been no formal military contacts since then.