MOSCOW, July 13. /TASS/: Ukraine should work to ensure its security, but not by creating threats to Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.
"Every country has a right to ensure its security and, of course, it has a right to choose the way to achieve that goal that it considers the best," he said on Rossiya-24 television.
Putin said there’s just one limitation for Ukraine when it seeks to ensure its security, which is that "the work to achieve security for one country shouldn’t create threats for another country."
"Therefore, we proceed from the understanding that this principle, which has been repeatedly proclaimed in various international documents, will be taken into account," the president said.
"Ukraine, of course, has a right to ensure its security," Putin said.
According to the president, the draft agreement between Moscow and Kiev, which was put together in Istanbul, stipulated detailed guarantees of Ukraine's security.
"The draft agreement between Russia and Ukraine, which was prepared in Istanbul and was subsequently tossed into the trash bin by the Ukrainian regime, set out in great detail the issues of ensuring Ukraine's security," Putin said.
He said the draft Istanbul agreement was acceptable to Moscow.
"We still had to think whether we agree with everything that was laid out there, but on the whole, I believe that this document was acceptable," the president said. "Therefore, there is nothing unusual for us in what was now proclaimed both by NATO and the G7, and we are not against discussing issues of this kind."
But he reiterated that such issues should be resolved "under the obligatory condition of ensuring the security of the Russian Federation."
On July 12, the G7 convened on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Vilnius and adopted a declaration on the general principles of long-term security guarantees for Ukraine. As a priority, it named increasing the supply of weapons, primarily long-range artillery and combat aviation.
