We are worse off than in the missile crisis

The regional tension in Eastern Europe and Russia is even more serious than the so-called missile crisis of October 1962, with Cuba at the centre of the discord after US President John Fitzgerald Kennedy revealed CIA reports of a military installation in Cuba that could be used to launch Soviet missiles.

The threat to the United States was direct, and that chapter resulted in high tension in the so-called Cold War, which was considered to be the one with the greatest risk of real confrontation between the two nuclear powers at the time.

The current challenge is even more dangerous because in addition to the actors involved there are many other countries openly positioned and with accumulated grudges and, of course, better armed than in 1962. A number of Chinese and Iranian troops have been conducting military manoeuvres in support of the Russian army.

If in the 1960s, it was the White House that cried foul - feeling its security violated - with Cuba 1,933 kilometres away, now the Kremlin is demanding that the United States and the rest of the NATO countries respect the Founding Act on NATO-Russia Relations, Cooperation and Mutual Security signed on 27 May 1997 in Paris.

This document laid the groundwork for an initial de-escalation of tensions between the American Union and Russia, primarily in Europe, which was seeking consolidation after the dismantling of the Soviet socialist bloc (the former USSR was extinguished on 25 December 1991); a new balance of power was recognised in the Act.

"NATO Member States reiterate that they have no intention, plans or reason to deploy nuclear weapons on the territory of new members and no need to alter NATO's nuclear deployment or nuclear policy, nor do they foresee any need to do so in the future. This includes the fact that NATO has no intention or need to establish nuclear stockpiles on the territory of such members', according to part of the text signed at the time by then Russian President Boris Yeltsin and his US counterpart, Bill Clinton, and NATO represented by Javier Solana.

The text was a kind of guarantee that Russia would feel reassured about the new states of its former confluence that wanted to join the North Atlantic Treaty and that they would not harbour nuclear weapons, nuclear bases or missile bases that would put the Kremlin's security at risk.

Since the demise of the USSR, not only the Warsaw Pact countries but also the newly formed republics have joined NATO, as was the case with Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic in 1999 and Romania, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Slovakia, the Baltic republics and Romania in 2004.

But the issue of Ukraine with its interest and intention to join NATO and the European Union (EU) has been particularly sensitive because the Russians feel attached to Kiev's history.

After Yeltsin's resignation (31 December 1999), Vladimir Putin became interim president and since then has been in power for several periods alternating as prime minister. In his foreign policy thinking, the Russian president demands that the United States and the Alliance comply with the 27 May 1997 text and that Ukraine has no chance of becoming a member, fearing for its security.

The distance between Ukraine and Moscow is 1,168.6 kilometres. President Putin is convinced that there can be no loopholes for the installation of military bases, nuclear depots or anti-missile systems in countries near its border. He also calls on NATO to withdraw all the weapons it has installed in several of its member countries that were formerly part of the USSR.

Since the disputed annexation of Crimea in 2014 and of Ossetia in 2008, after invading Georgia under the pretext of protecting Russian interests in Ossetia and Abkhazia, the war on the border with Ukraine has left more than 14,000 dead in a permanently open conflict.

The CIA leak of a Russian troop movement into Ukraine, with the intention of invading the country, has kept a hot new Cold War 2.0 raging since last December, threatening to get on the nerves.

And since then, we have been on tenterhooks as the Russians send their demands for new regional security conditions to the Americans and the phones are ringing off the hook, with several leaders involved in the confrontation and others attempting direct dialogue.

This week the UN comes into action, through its Security Council, convened by Washington. The clock is ticking and the world is not standing still either... peace is a thin red line.