OREANDA-NEWS. The Cuban crisis in US-Russian relations may be repeated, but there is still time to agree on the non-extension of NATO. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said this, TASS reported.

"You know, it may well come to that,"- he replied to a related question.

According to him, if "the other side doesn't understand" and the situation continues to develop in the current vein, both countries may "wake up and see themselves in something similar." Ryabkov called such an outcome a failure of diplomacy and foreign policy.

The Cuban Missile Crisis was the name given to the political, diplomatic and military confrontation between the US and the USSR in October 1962. It was triggered by the deployment of nuclear weapons by the United States at a base in Turkey and by Moscow at a base in Cuba.

Russia considers Ukraine's possible accession to NATO a "red line". On 1 December, President Vladimir Putin said Moscow wanted legal guarantees that NATO would not expand eastwards and proposed to start substantive talks on the issue. Putin later discussed the issue in an online meeting with his US counterpart Joe Biden. The heads of state agreed to instruct their representatives to "enter into substantive consultations on these sensitive topics,"- the Kremlin said.

At the same time, US presidential national security adviser Jake Sullivan stressed that the US president had not made any concessions or commitments regarding the non-expansion of NATO to the east.

Ryabkov later said that Russia and the USA would work out the format of a meeting to discuss security guarantees.