MORE TROUBLE FOR RUSSIA, as NATO suspends cooperation with Moscow

  This might not be a good one for the Kremlin, as the showdown just begun. NATO will suspend "all practical civilian and military cooperation" with Russia because of its annexation of Crimea, saying it has seen no sign that Moscow was withdrawing troops from the Ukrainian border.Foreign ministers from the 28 members of the Western military alliance met in Brussels on Tuesday for the first time since Russia grabbed the Black Sea peninsula from Ukraine last month, triggering the worst East-West crisis since the Cold War.
They were discussing ways to boost NATO's military presence in formerly communist central and eastern Europe to reassure allies worried by Russia's moves.After the session, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Russia has challenged truths that only a few weeks ago seemed self-evident: that European borders in the 21st century would not be redrawn by force."It is important for everybody in the world to understand that the NATO alliance takes seriously this attempt to change borders by use of force," he said. "So that is the wake-up call." 
Russia's aggression "is the gravest threat to European security in a generation and it challenges our vision of a Europe whole, free and at peace," NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen told reporters. In a joint statement announcing the suspension of cooperation, the ministers said political dialogue in the NATO-Russia Council could continue, "as necessary, at the ambassadorial level and above, to allow us to exchange views, first and foremost on this crisis."They said they would review NATO's relations with Russia at their next meeting in June. NATO and Russia have cooperated on an anti-narcotics operation in Afghanistan, counterpiracy and various counterterrorism measures. Rasmussen said cooperation on the anti-narcotics operations would continue.

A NATO official told said, the ministers had decided the alliance would develop, as a matter of urgency, "a series of additional measures to reinforce NATO's collective defenses."These would include possible deployments and reinforcements of alliance military assets in Eastern European member states, a possible review of training and exercise plans in the near term, a possible increase of the readiness level of the NATO Response Force, and a possible review and update of NATO defense and military plans, the official said.