Russia is always ready for direct talks with NATO, but has no plans of delivering reports to any side about military drills on its own territory, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday, TASS reports.
"We are ready to hold direct talks with NATO," Putin said speaking at the plenary session of the Russian Energy Week forum. "However, if speaking about our soldiers, I must say that they are deployed on the territory of Russia."
"It is true that we recently held military drills, the Zapad-2021 [strategic military exercise], and it was a large-scale military exercise," he continued. "I reiterate that we are holding our [military] exercises on the territory of our own country."
"There is nothing strange about it and we are not obliged of filing reports in this regard to any other party," Putin added.
The Russian president also said that the US and NATO military forces regularly hold combat drills not on their territories, including near the state borders of Russia.
