Russia tried to seize the high ground over its relations with Nato today when it told the alliance it planned to halt all military cooperation until further notice.

Nato foreign ministers, however, had already made it clear at its emergency meeting on Georgia in Brussels on Tuesday that it could not envisage convening a Nato-Russia Council session until all Russian troops had been withdrawn from Georgia.

The military freeze between Russia and the alliance became official today. Under the security partnership with Nato, Russia has been cooperating on counter-terrorism and consulting on regional issues where Moscow and the West have mutual interests.

“We have received notification from the Russians through military channels and they say that they have decided to halt international military-cooperation events between Russia and Nato countries until further instruction,” a spokeswoman for the alliance said.

The freeze has already led to the cancellation of Russian naval participation in an alliance exercise in the Baltic Sea and the planned visit to Russia of a US frigate has been scrapped. The White House said the Russian decision was “unfortunate”.

The freeze on military cooperation is likely to last for some time. Even if the Russian troops pull out of Georgia, Nato officials are saying that Russia must withdraw to the position it was in pre-August 6/7 when the conflict in the region began.

This means that Russia will be expected to remove all of its troops back into Russian territory except for the 600-1,000 “peacekeepers” who were serving in South Ossetia, the breakaway Georgian region. Moscow is currently insisting that up to 500 Russian troops will remain in Georgia itself and that the peacekeeping force in South Ossetia will be boosted by several thousand extra troops.

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