Sergey Mikheyev, Director General of the Institute for Caspian Cooperation, said that the West had lost its chance to improve relations with Russia in the 1990s, despite all the concessions Russia had made.
He believes that the West still treats Russia in the Cold War context. Mikheyev supposes that the conservative role of the US in Europe is the main cause of such attitude. If Russia and Europe improve relations, the US role in Europe and Eurasia will decline and interest in the NATO will drop.
The expert reminded that Gazprom had been accused of trying to take over domestic gas-distribution networks of West Europe, which is absurd, because Europe had been buying Soviet gas and had not complained about it.
Mikheyev mentioned the information war during the South Ossetian conflict of 2008. When Georgian forces were attacking Tskhinvali, European mass media were broadcasting it as an attack of Russia on Tbilisi. The expert assures that it was a purposeful lie to undermine trust in Russia.
