We have taken note of the reply of Peter Stano, the Lead Spokesperson for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Commission published by TASS news agency on 22 December 2021 to the agency’s request to comment on the statement previously made by Andrey Krutskikh, Russian Special Presidential Envoy for international cooperation on information security, Director of the Department of international information security of the Russian MFA regarding Moscow’s offer to Brussels to start talks on cybersecurity. Peter Stano alleged that the EU had not received any official information on the willingness of Russian authorities to engage in a cybersecurity dialogue.
We would like to clear the situation.
In contacts with representatives of the European External Action Service and the European Commission, we have repeatedly proposed to the EU side to start substantive talks on the above-mentioned issues. Particularly as Russia held relevant consultations this year with a number of EU Member States.
Moreover, given the accusations launched against Russia of alleged involvement of Russian individuals and organisations in “malicious” activities in cyberspace, back in November 2020 Russia officially proposed to the European Union to establish contacts between its relevant bodies and the Russian National Computer Incident Response and Coordination Centre (NCIRCC), which is authorised to engage in appropriate international cooperation.
Taking the above into account, we reaffirm the readiness of the Russian side to establish Russia-EU dialogue on cybersecurity aimed at eliminating existing problematic issues in that area.
At the same time, we would like to emphasise that we believe that attempts by Brussels to shift responsibility for numerous irritants in bilateral relations exclusively to the Russian side are totally unacceptable.
