The relations between the NATO military alliance and the Russian Federation were established in 1991 within the framework of the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council. In 1994, Russia joined the Partnership for Peace program, and since then, NATO and Russia have signed several significant cooperation agreements. According to Vladimir Putin, he proposed the idea of Russia joining NATO to President Bill Clinton during a visit to Moscow in 2000, to which Clinton responded that he saw no objection.
The NATO-Russia Council was created in 2002 to address security issues and joint projects. Cooperation between Russia and NATO now develops across several main areas, including: counter-terrorism, military cooperation, collaboration in Afghanistan (including the transport of non-military cargo by Russia for the International Security Assistance Force and combating local drug production), industrial cooperation, and non-proliferation of weapons.
On April 1, 2014, NATO unanimously decided to suspend cooperation with the Russian Federation following Russia’s annexation of Crimea amidst the Russo-Ukrainian conflict. On February 18, 2017, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov expressed support for the resumption of military cooperation with NATO. At the end of March 2017, the Council met prior to the NATO Foreign Ministers’ Conference in Brussels, Belgium. Relations significantly deteriorated during the diplomatic crisis stemming from Russia’s actions in Ukraine that began in March 2021, followed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Post-Cold War Cooperation
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, NATO and the Soviet Union (now Russia) began multi-level talks, including on treaties for arms control such as the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. Soviet Foreign Minister Shevardnadze first visited NATO headquarters on December 19, 1989, before informal talks in 1990 between NATO and Soviet military leaders. NATO Secretary-General Manfred Wörner visited Moscow in July 1990 to discuss future cooperation, marking a first for NATO-Russia relations.
Official contacts and cooperation between Russia and NATO began in 1991 under the North Atlantic Cooperation Council (later renamed the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council). These were deepened by Russia’s accession to the Partnership for Peace program on June 22, 1994.
On May 27, 1997, during the NATO summit in Paris, France, NATO and Russia signed the Founding Act on Mutual Relations, Cooperation, and Security, a roadmap for potential cooperation between NATO and Russia. The parties stated that they did not see each other as adversaries and would “establish together a lasting and inclusive peace in the Euro-Atlantic area, based on the principles of democracy and cooperative security.”
In December 2009, NATO sought Russia’s assistance in Afghanistan to request the transportation of supplies (potentially military) across Russian territory to Afghanistan and to provide more helicopters to Afghan armed forces. Russia has so far rejected these requests despite continuing to allow the transit of non-military supplies across its territory.
On June 6, 2011, NATO and Russia participated in their first-ever air exercise, named “Vigilant Skies 2011.” Since the Cold War, this was only the second joint military venture between the alliance and Russia, the first being a joint naval exercise that began on May 30, 2011.
In April 2012, there were protests in Russia against the country’s participation in NATO, mostly composed of ultranationalist and leftist groups.
Reuters reported in February 2014 that Russia and NATO were devising plans to jointly protect the MV Cape Ray, used for the dismantlement of Syrian chemical weapons.
Suspension of Cooperation and Military Buildup
In early March 2014, tensions between NATO and Russia escalated following the Russo-Ukrainian War and Russia’s decision to annex Crimea; NATO urged Russia to cease its actions and asserted support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. On April 1, 2014, NATO issued a statement from its foreign ministers announcing the suspension of all civilian and military cooperation with Russia, condemning “Russia’s illegal military intervention in Ukraine and its violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
In the spring, Russia’s Defense Ministry announced plans to deploy additional forces in Crimea as part of a strengthening of its Black Sea fleet, including the redeployment by 2016 of long-range, nuclear-capable Tupolev Tu-22M3 bombers, which were the backbone of Soviet naval strike units during the Cold War. NATO was alarmed by these measures; in November, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander, U.S. General Philip Breedlove, stated that the alliance was “closely monitoring indicators,” fearing that Russia might move its nuclear arsenal to the peninsula. In December, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov asserted that this would be legitimate since “Crimea is now part of a country that has such weapons under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.”
At the NATO summit in Wales in early September, the NATO-Ukraine Commission adopted a joint statement condemning “the illegal and illegitimate declaration of annexation by Russia of Crimea and its ongoing, deliberate destabilization of eastern Ukraine in violation of international law;” this stance was reaffirmed in the early December statement by the same body.
A report published in November highlighted that military confrontation between Russia and the West (primarily NATO countries) had reached Cold War levels: 40 dangerous or precarious incidents were recorded over the previous eight months, including a reconnaissance plane crossing paths with a passenger plane taking off from Denmark in March with 132 passengers aboard. An unprecedented increase in Russian air and naval activity in the Baltic region prompted NATO to ramp up its long-standing rotation of military fighters in Lithuania. A similar Russian air force effort has intensified its activities in the Asia-Pacific region due to the resumed use of the previously abandoned Soviet military base at Cam Ranh Bay in Vietnam. In March 2015, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu stated that long-range Russian bombers would continue to patrol various parts of the world and expand to other regions.
In July, the United States formally accused Russia of violating the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) by testing a banned medium-range cruise missile (presumably the R-500, a modification of the Iskander) and threatened to respond accordingly. In early June 2015, the U.S. State Department reported that Russia had not rectified its INF violation. According to a 2014 U.S. government report, Russia had 1,643 nuclear warheads ready for launch (up from 1,537 in 2011), one more than the United States, thus surpassing the U.S. for the first time since 2000. The deployed capacities of both countries are in violation of the 2010 New START treaty, which sets a ceiling of 1,550 warheads. Similarly, even before 2014, the United States had decided to implement a large-scale program, worth up to one trillion dollars, aimed at revitalizing its entire nuclear sector, including plans for a new generation of delivery vehicles and construction of research facilities in Los Alamos, New Mexico, and at the National Security Campus south of Kansas City.
At the end of 2014, Putin approved a revised national military doctrine identifying NATO’s military buildup near Russian borders as the primary military threat.
Rapid Reaction Force
On December 2, 2014, the foreign ministers of NATO countries announced the creation of a rapid reaction strike force (the “Very High Readiness Joint Task Force”) established in accordance with the action plan agreed upon at the NATO summit in Wales in early September 2014. This initiative aimed to enhance NATO’s presence in the eastern part of the alliance. In June 2015, NATO tested the new rapid reaction force for the first time during military exercises held in Poland, with over 2,000 soldiers from nine states participating. At the end of the exercises, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced that the force deployed in Eastern Europe would be increased to 40,000 troops.
In early February 2015, NATO diplomats expressed concern about Russia’s nuclear strategy, which seemed to indicate a lowering of the threshold for nuclear weapon use in any conflict. This assessment was followed by British Defence Secretary Michael Fallon stating that the UK needed to update its nuclear arsenal in response to Russia’s modernization of its nuclear forces. Later in February, Fallon suggested that Putin might repeat tactics used in Ukraine against the Baltic members of NATO. He also added, “NATO must be ready for any form of aggression from Russia, whatever its shape. NATO is preparing.” Fallon noted that this was not a new Cold War with Russia, as the situation was already “rather warm.”
In March 2015, Russia, citing NATO’s de facto violation of the 1990 Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, declared that the suspension of its participation in this treaty, announced in 2007, was now “complete,” effectively ending its participation in the treaty’s consultative group.
In early April 2015, leaked information attributed to unofficial sources within the Russian military and intelligence services suggested Russia was preparing a nuclear response to certain hostile non-nuclear acts by NATO; these implicit threats were interpreted as “an attempt to create strategic uncertainty” and undermine Western political cohesion. In the same vein, Norwegian Defence Minister Ine Eriksen Soreide stated that Russia had “created uncertainty about its intentions.”
In June 2015, an independent Russian military analyst stated: “Everyone should understand that we live in a world completely different from what it was two years ago. In that lost world, it was possible to arrange your security through treaties and mutual confidence-building measures. We are now in a completely different situation where the general means of ensuring your security is military deterrence.”
On June 16, 2015, Tass quoted Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Aleksey Meshkov stating that “none of the previously operational Russian-NATO programs were operational at any level.”
At the end of June 2015, during a visit to Estonia, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter announced that the United States would deploy heavy weapons, including tanks, armored vehicles, and artillery, in Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania. Western commentators interpreted this move as the beginning of a shift in NATO’s strategy. A Russian Defense Ministry official described this act as “the most aggressive act by Washington since the Cold War.” For its part, the U.S. expressed concern over Putin’s announcement of his intention to add over 40 new ballistic missiles to Russia’s nuclear arsenal in 2015. U.S. observers and analysts, such as Steven Pifer, noted that the U.S. had no reason to be alarmed by the new missiles, provided that Russia remained within the limits of the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty of 2010 (New START). However, Pifer suggested that the most alarming motivation behind this rhetoric might be that Putin views nuclear weapons not only as deterrents but also as tools of coercion. Meanwhile, by the end of June 2015, reports indicated that the production schedule for the new thermonuclear intercontinental ballistic missile Sarmat, equipped with MIRV and intended to replace the obsolete Soviet-era SS-18 Satan missiles, was slipping. Commentators also highlighted inevitable financial and technological constraints that would hinder any genuine arms race with the West if Russia embarked on that path.
Tensions between NATO and Russia further escalated after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane on November 24, 2015, which allegedly violated its airspace while conducting a mission in northwest Syria.
On December 2, 2015, NATO member states officially invited Montenegro to join the alliance, prompting Russia to react by suspending its cooperation with the country.
Shortly before a NATO-Russia Council meeting, the first of its kind since June 2014, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov spoke of what he considered “an unprecedented military build-up since the end of the Cold War” and NATO’s presence on the so-called eastern flank of the alliance aimed at exerting military and political pressure on Russia. He asserted that Russia would not consider or be dragged into senseless confrontation and was convinced there was no reasonable alternative to mutually beneficial pan-European cooperation in the field of security, based on the principle of the indivisibility of security under international law.
After the meeting, the Russian ambassador to NATO stated that his country felt comfortable without cooperative relations with the alliance. He noted that, at that time, Russia and NATO had no positive agenda to pursue. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg stated: “NATO and Russia have deep and persistent disagreements. Today’s meeting did not change the game.” The opening of NATO’s first missile defense system site in Deveselu, Romania, in May 2016, caused Russia to reiterate its position that the system being built by the United States undermined Russia’s security and posed a “direct threat to global and regional security,” and that measures “were being taken to ensure the necessary security level for Russia.”
The NATO summit held in Warsaw in July 2016 approved a plan to deploy four battalions totaling between 3,000 and 4,000 troops to the Baltic states and Eastern Poland in early 2017, and to intensify air and maritime patrols to assure allies who were formerly part of the Soviet Bloc. The adopted communiqué explained that the decision aimed to “unambiguously demonstrate, within the framework of our overall posture, the solidarity, determination, and capacity of Allies to act by triggering an immediate response from Allies to any aggression.” The summit reaffirmed NATO’s earlier decision to “suspend all practical civilian and military cooperation between NATO and Russia while remaining open to political dialogue with Russia.” The heads of state and government “condemned ongoing and large-scale Russian military build-up in Crimea.”
They also stated that “the significant military presence and support of Russia for the regime in Syria” and its military build-up in the Eastern Mediterranean “posed new risks and challenges to the security of Allies and others.” NATO leaders decided to enhance their support for Ukraine: during a NATO-Ukraine Commission meeting, the Allied leaders discussed the security situation with Ukrainian President Poroshenko, welcoming the government’s reform plans and approving a comprehensive assistance program for Ukraine to “help make Ukrainian defense and security institutions more effective, efficient, and accountable.”
During the NATO-Russia Council meeting that took place shortly after the Warsaw summit, Russia warned NATO against escalating its military activities in the Black Sea. Russia also announced its agreement for its military aircraft pilots over the Baltic region to turn on their cockpit transponders if NATO aircraft did the same.
In mid-July 2016, the Russian military announced that an infantry regiment equipped with S-400 missile systems would be deployed in the Crimean city of Feodosia in August of that year, enhancing Russian capabilities around the peninsula.
In July 2017, the NATO-Russia Council met in Brussels. Following the meeting, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg commented that Allies and Russia had a “frank and constructive discussion” on Ukraine, Afghanistan, transparency, and risk reduction. Both sides informed each other about the Zapad 2017 exercise between Russia and Belarus and NATO’s Trident Javelin 2017 exercise.
By the end of August 2017, NATO announced that the four multinational battlegroups in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland were fully operational, in accordance with the decision made at the Warsaw summit in 2016.
Stoltenberg and the Russian Federation
On March 25, 2014, Stoltenberg delivered a speech at a Labor Party convention where he harshly criticized Russia for its invasion of Crimea, asserting that Russia threatened security and stability in Europe and violated international law. After his election as NATO Secretary General, Stoltenberg emphasized that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was a “brutal reminder of NATO’s necessity,” stating that Russia’s actions in Ukraine represented “the first violation of another country’s territory since World War II.”
Stoltenberg stressed the necessity for NATO to possess sufficiently strong military capabilities, including nuclear weapons, to deter Russia from violating international law and threatening the security of its member states. He underscored the importance of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty and NATO’s responsibility to defend the security of its Eastern members. He further stated that Russia must be sanctioned for its actions in Ukraine and that Ukraine’s potential membership in NATO would be “a very important issue” in the near future. Stoltenberg expressed concern over Russia’s acquisition of new cruise missiles.
He described NATO as “the most successful alliance in history,” stating that “NATO has ensured peace in Europe since its inception and has managed to adapt to new security challenges.”
Regarding the issue of terrorism, he called for increased cooperation with Russia in the fight against terrorism following the deadly attack on the offices of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo in Paris.
Under Stoltenberg’s leadership, the alliance adopted a radically new stance on propaganda and counter-propaganda in 2015. In a report, a journalist stated that “as part of the hardened position, the UK has committed £750,000 of British funds to support a counter-propaganda unit based at NATO headquarters in Brussels.”
On November 24, 2015, Stoltenberg declared: “We stand in solidarity with Turkey and support the territorial integrity of our NATO ally,” after Turkey shot down a Russian military aircraft which allegedly violated Turkish airspace for 17 seconds near the Syrian border.
In response to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, Stoltenberg announced on March 27 that NATO would expel seven Russian diplomats from the Russian mission to NATO in Brussels. Furthermore, three unfilled positions in the mission were denied accreditation by NATO. Russia accused the U.S. of orchestrating NATO’s response.
On October 6, 2021, NATO announced it had withdrawn accreditation from eight members of the Russian mission for espionage and reduced the number of positions that Russia could accredit to the Alliance to ten.
On October 18, 2021, the Russian Foreign Minister announced the suspension of its mission to NATO and that of the Alliance in Moscow.
NATO-Russia Council
The NATO-Russia Council was established on May 28, 2002, during the NATO summit in Rome. The council has served as an official diplomatic tool for addressing security issues and common projects between NATO and Russia, involving “the search for consensus, consultations, common decisions, and joint actions.”
The “common decisions and actions” undertaken under the agreements of the NATO-Russia Council include counterterrorism efforts, military cooperation (joint military exercises and personnel training), cooperation on Afghanistan (Russia organizing training courses for anti-drug officers in Afghanistan and Central Asian countries in cooperation with the UN), transporting non-military goods to support NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, industrial cooperation, defense interoperability cooperation, non-proliferation, and other areas.
The heads of state of NATO countries and Russia reported positively on the achievements of the NATO-Russia Council at the Bucharest summit in April 2008, although both sides expressed mild dissatisfaction with the lack of substantial outcomes from the council. In January 2009, the Russian envoy to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, stated that the NATO-Russia Council was “an organ where school-like discussions took place.” An American official shared this view by stating, “We now want to structure cooperation in a more practical way, in areas where you can achieve results, rather than insisting on things that will not happen.”
Conflicts of Interest
Relations between Russia and NATO deteriorated in the summer of 2008 due to Russia’s war with Georgia. Later, the North Atlantic Council condemned Russia for recognizing the independence of the Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The NATO Secretary-General asserted that Russia’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia constituted a violation of numerous UN Security Council resolutions, including resolutions passed by Russia itself. Conversely, Russia insisted that the recognition was based on the situation on the ground and complied with the UN Charter, the CSCE Accord in Helsinki of 1975, and other fundamental international laws; Russian media strongly emphasized the precedent of Kosovo’s recent declaration of independence. Relations further strained in May 2009 when NATO expelled two Russian diplomats under the pretext of espionage. This added to the tension already created by proposed NATO military exercises in Georgia, as stated by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev:
“The planned NATO exercises in Georgia, no matter how hard we try to convince ourselves otherwise, are a blatant provocation. You cannot conduct exercises in a place where there has been a war.”
Before the 2011 Russian parliamentary elections, President Dmitry Medvedev reportedly stated that if Russia had not joined the South Ossetia war in 2008, NATO would have expanded further eastward.
NATO Missile Defense
The Russian government declares that a proposed U.S. missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic could threaten its own defenses. The commander of the Russian space forces, Colonel General Vladimir Popovkin, stated in 2007 that “(the) trajectories of Iranian or North Korean missiles would practically not pass near the territory of the Czech Republic, but any possible launch of a Russian ICBM from Russian territory or from the Russian Northern Fleet would be monitored by radar.”
However, in 2009, Barack Obama canceled the missile defense project in Poland and the Czech Republic after Russia threatened the U.S. with military intervention. Poland was warned that by accepting the NATO missile defense system, it would expose itself to a nuclear attack from Russia.
Russia has also warned against the deployment of defensive missiles at the Turkey-Syria border.
In February 2010, Romania announced an agreement with the United States for a missile defense system, which Russia interpreted as a threat to its national security.
NATO Expansion Plans in Ukraine and Georgia
The Russian government believes that NATO’s expansion plans in Ukraine and Georgia could negatively impact European security. Similarly, Russians are largely vehemently opposed to any eastward expansion of NATO. Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev stated in 2008 that no country would be pleased with a military bloc that it did not belong to approaching its borders.
Suggestions for Russia’s Membership in NATO
The idea of Russia becoming a NATO member has been proposed several times by Western and Russian leaders, as well as by some experts. In a series of interviews with filmmaker Oliver Stone, President Vladimir Putin mentioned that he considered the possibility of Russia joining NATO with Bill Clinton during his visit to Moscow in 2000. Putin stated: “During the meeting, I said, ‘Let’s consider an option where Russia could join NATO,’ to which Mr. Clinton replied, ‘Why not?’ But the American delegation became very nervous.” According to former NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, in the early days of his presidency, between 2000 and 2001, Putin made many statements indicating his strong support for the idea of Russia’s NATO membership. When Rasmussen first met President Putin in 2002, the Russian leader appeared very “pro-Western.”
In 1990, during negotiations for the reunification of Germany at the end of the Cold War with U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev stated, “You say NATO is not directed against us, but is simply a security structure for new realities… we therefore propose joining NATO.” However, Baker dismissed this possibility as a “dream.”
In March 2009, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski suggested including Russia in NATO. Speaking to one of Poland’s leading newspapers after the conference, Sikorski explained, “I stand by all that I said, but that does not mean that I invite Russia to join NATO. I simply presented a certain hypothetical vision, referencing a debate that occurred within NATO in the mid-1990s. Then, under the Clinton administration, there was a debate on whether and under what conditions Russia could become a member of the Alliance.” However, Russian leaders clarified that Russia was not considering joining the alliance, preferring to maintain cooperation at a lower level. In March 2009, Russian envoy to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, in response to Radosław Sikorski’s proposal, stated, “Great powers do not join a coalition in the future. Russia considers itself a great power.”
At the beginning of 2010, this suggestion was reiterated in an open letter co-signed by German defense experts, General Klaus Naumann, Frank Elbe, Ulrich Weisser, and former German Defense Minister Volker Rühe. The authors of the letter argued that Russia was necessary for NATO to counterbalance emerging Asian powers in a multipolar world.
In September 2010, in New York, the NATO-Russia Council met for the first time after its relations were suspended following the war between Russia and Georgia in 2008; on the eve of the meeting, the U.S. permanent representative to NATO, Ivo Daalder, mentioned the hypothetical possibility of Russia joining NATO.
Ideology and Propaganda
Both Russia and NATO are reportedly engaged in a propaganda war, with both sides funding various media outlets to help disseminate their messages. Russia finances international television channels such as RT, Rossiya Segodnya (including Sputnik), and TASS, as well as several national media networks. NATO countries fund international broadcasters like Voice of America and BBC World Service. Russian media have particularly criticized the United States. In 2014, Russia cut the radio transmissions of Voice of America after the latter criticized Russia’s actions in Ukraine. Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index gives low ratings to press freedom in Russia, and the country restricts foreign ownership of media to less than 20%. In January 2015, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Lithuania, and Estonia called on the European Union to jointly combat Russian propaganda by establishing a “permanent platform” to collaborate with NATO on strategic communications and to strengthen local media in the Russian language. Federica Mogherini, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, stated on January 19, 2015, that she was considering creating a Russian-language media entity targeting Russian-speaking audiences in Eastern Partnership countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine, as well as in EU member states.
Vladimir Putin has presented Eurasianism and “putinism” as alternatives to the Western ideals adopted by many NATO countries. Putinism combines state capitalism with authoritarian nationalism. Putin and Russia as a whole have lost respect for the values and moral authority of the West, creating a “values gap” between Russia and the West. Putin promoted his brand of Russian conservative values and emphasized the importance of religion. Gay rights have divided Russia and many NATO countries, with the United States and several European countries using their soft power to promote the protection of gay rights in Eastern Europe. Russia, on the other hand, has restricted homosexual freedoms and gained support from those opposing same-sex marriage.
In March 2016, Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, stated that Russia was in an “information war,” primarily with “Anglo-Saxon media.”
Trade and Economy
After the fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation moved towards a more open economy with less state intervention, becoming an important part of the global economy. In 1998, Russia joined the G8, a forum comprised of eight major developed countries, six of which are NATO members. In 2012, Russia joined the World Trade Organization, an organization of governments determined to reduce tariffs and other trade barriers. These increased economic ties provided Russia with access to new markets and capital, as well as political leverage from the West and other countries. Russian gas exports eventually came to be seen as a weapon against NATO countries, and the United States and other Western nations worked to reduce Europe’s dependence on Russian resources. The Russian economy is heavily reliant on exports of natural resources such as oil and natural gas, which Russia has used to its advantage. Since the mid-2000s, Russia and Ukraine have had several disputes in which Russia threatened to cut off gas supplies. As a significant portion of Russian gas is exported to Europe through pipelines crossing Ukraine, these disputes affected several NATO countries. While Russia claimed that the disputes stemmed from Ukraine’s non-payment of its bills, it may also have been motivated by a desire to punish the pro-Western government that came to power after the Orange Revolution.
While Russia’s new role in the global economy offered several opportunities, it also made the federation more vulnerable to external economic trends and pressures. Like many other countries, the Russian economy suffered during the Great Recession. Following Russia’s annexation of Crimea, several countries (including most NATO members) imposed sanctions on Russia, harming its economy by cutting off access to capital. At the same time, global oil prices fell. The combination of Western sanctions and the drop in crude oil prices in 2014 subsequently led to the Russian financial crisis of 2014-2015.
References
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