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HELSINKI (Reuters) - Russia told the European Union Friday that their future relations would be well served by a European security system in which the United States and NATO played second fiddle.
The proposal was included in Russia's blueprint on long-term relations with the 15-nation bloc, presented to EU leaders by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin at a meeting in Helsinki.
"The partnership of the Russian Federation and the European Union could include organization of a pan-European security system based on European forces, without isolating the USA and NATO, but without the monopoly of these on the continent," the text of the document, obtained by Reuters, said.
Moscow vehemently opposed NATO's expansion into former communist Eastern Europe earlier this year, which brought its former Cold War adversary closer to Russia's doorstep.
Russia said it wanted a bigger role in European affairs and better relations with the EU, but would not seek either membership or association with it.
It also said it was interested in a Finnish proposal to stage a three-way summit with the EU and the United States, and called for regular meetings between the Russian prime minister and European Commission president.
The Russian paper is a response to the EU's own Russia strategy presented earlier this year.
But the meeting in Helsinki, called to map out the future of relations between Russia and the expanding EU, was overshadowed by Moscow's increasingly bloody thrust into Chechnya.
The EU, represented in Helsinki by its new foreign affairs supremo Javier Solana, Finnish Prime Minister Paavo Lipponen and European Commission president Romano Prodi, welcomed the Russian paper.
"We consider this to be a singularly important outcome in our evolving partnership with Russia," said Lipponen, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency.