Reuters, Moscow :Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview that Moscow does not plan to maintain its military presence in Syria indefinitely.In an interview with Time magazine Medvedev was asked if Russia would help its ally, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, in his stated aim of restoring his control over all of Syria.”We have no plans… for such a never-ending presence in Syria. We are there pursuing an entirely limited, concrete objective,” Medvedev said, according to a transcript of the interview released by the government.Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has warned other nations against committing their troops to a ground action in Syria, saying it would only exacerbate the conflict.Medvedev, speaking in an interview with the German newspaper Handelsblatt, the text of which was released by his office Friday, said “a ground operation draws everyone taking part in it into a war.”Commenting on a Saudi proposal to send troops to Syria and the possibility of U.S. involvement in ground action, Medvedev said there wouldn’t be a quick victory, rather a “permanent war.” He reaffirmed that Russia, which has conducted air campaign in Syria since Sept. 30, has no intention to engage in ground action.Medvedev said the conflict must be resolved through talks, not by opening another front in the war.Earlier, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said the world was fighting a new Cold War, warning of grave consequences for the West if it didn’t cooperate with Russia in Syria and elsewhere.”We have slid, in essence, into times of a new Cold War,” Medvedev said in a speech Saturday to senior international officials at a marquee security conference in Germany.Medvedev cited the Syria conflict as an arena of much needed Russian-Western cooperation, especially on military issues.The key to resolving that conflict, he said, was the cooperation of “Russian and American military officials – regularly, constantly, every day.”Medvedev insisted in his speech and a short Q-and-A session alongside French Prime Minister Manuel Valls that the West faced a stark choice: cooperate with Russia on common interests such as fighting terrorism and ensuring stability in the Middle East – or face a permanent, global conflict. He said the U.S. and Western Europe had departed from a post-World War II security architecture that had ensured 70 years of relative stability.
