NATO logo in front of Brussels headquartersROME, Jan 28Ukraine's entry into NATO will be a provocation for Russia, which, after the collapse of the USSR, was promised not to expand the alliance to the east, Italian parliamentarian, senator from the 5 Star Movement (D5Z) Gianluca Ferrara told RIA Novosti. «I hope that common sense will prevail. I understand and the position of Russia, which sees Ukraine as a buffer state. Its entry into the alliance would be a provocation and lead to a deterioration in the security situation,» said Ferrara, who heads the D5Z group on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee. 
In France, they wanted to leave NATO so as not to be at enmity with RussiaAccording to him, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev was promised non-expansion of NATO to the east. In the current situation, Ukraine has become a country that is located in the middle of two large forces, he noted. «Now, objectively, Russia is surrounded by NATO forces. On the other hand, I believe that Ukraine, as a sovereign state, may have the right to join NATO. If this happens, for the Russian side, hostile sentiments will be in the immediate vicinity,» the parliamentarian said, calling the prospect of a possible military conflict between the two sides «madness.» Perhaps there is a psychological moment in this, but the fact that NATO has approached Russia is a given, when it was promised otherwise,» Ferrara said on the sidelines of the Italian parliament during the election of the country's future president. Troops from the «three countries» On Wednesday, the United States and NATO handed over to Moscow written responses to Russia's proposals for security guarantees. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier that Moscow is studying the responses of the United States and NATO, after interdepartmental coordination it will be reported to Russian President Vladimir Putin, he will decide on further steps. At the end of 2021, Russia published draft treaties with the United States and agreements with NATO on security guarantees . Moscow, in particular, demands from its Western partners legal guarantees of refusing further eastward expansion of NATO, joining the Ukrainian bloc, and establishing military bases in post-Soviet countries. The proposals also contain a clause on the non-deployment of NATO strike weapons near the borders of Russia and the withdrawal of alliance forces in Eastern Europe to the positions of 1997.
