PRESIDENT Yeltsin and other Russian leaders agreed on tough opposition to NATO's plans to expand eastwards yesterday and ordered a plan of action to be drawn up to prepare Moscow's response.
Mr Yeltsin summoned the Prime Minister, Mr Viktor Chernomyrdin, the Foreign Minister, Mr Yevgeny Primakov, the Kremlin chief of staff, Mr Anatoly Chubais, and security chiefs after weekend talks with the German Chancellor, Dr Helmut Kohl, produced no breakthrough.
"Russia's unequivocally negative position in relation to NATO's plans to expand to the East was confirmed," Mr Yeltsin's press secretary, Mr Sergei Yastrzhembsky, told a Kremlin briefing.
The leaders discussed ways to co operate with NATO but also how to respond if the Western alliance goes ahead with its plans to take in former members of the Soviet bloc, which Moscow says would threaten its security.
Mr Yeltsin ordered the foreign ministry to take responsibility for preparing a flexible response to enlargement.
"A plan of action will be worked out on Russia's position, its negative position. Consequently, action plans can be worked out for various circumstances," Mr Yastrzhembsky said.
"NATO expansion can, after all, be multi faceted and could involve various decisions, so Russia's position must include possible adequate steps for various scenarios.'
Dr Kohl said after meeting Mr Yeltsin on Saturday that he hoped a "rational solution" could be reached on the enlargement issue to satisfy all sides' security concerns.
Mr Yastrzhembsky said both sides had agreed that Russia NATO relations were "issue number one" in international relations for 1997 but made it clear that progress had been insignificant.
The dispute looks set to shape Russia's foreign policy as the alliance prepares to issue member ship invitations next July, with Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic heading the list.
Russia seems determined to win as many concessions as possible even if it cannot prevent enlargement.
In London, Western diplomatic sources said that Mr Yeltsin had set out demands to Dr Kohl for a legally binding commitment from NATO to involve Russia in formal consultations with NATO on any issue including enlargement.
. Mr Yeltsin has "a heavy cold" and a temperature and has cancelled several meetings planned for the coming days, the Kremlin said yesterday.
Mr Yastrzhembsky told a Kremlin briefing that the illness had no relation to the 65 year old Kremlin leader's recent heart bypass surgery.