MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday blamed Western countries for provoking the Ukraine crisis, which is used to resuscitate NATO.

"A decision has recently been made to increase NATO military presence in Eastern Europe. The crisis in Ukraine, which was basically provoked and created by some of our Western partners, is now being used to resuscitate this military bloc," Putin told a government meeting.

He said Russia will have to react to new security threats.

"We will take all these things (like NATO's expansion) into consideration when making our country's defense and security plan. We will have to do everything to guarantee our safety," Putin was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying.

Meanwhile, Russia will not sever cooperation with foreign partners, he said, but "existing risks" must be taken into account.

"Our industry must be ready to produce critically important equipment, components and materials, to develop sufficient manufacturing capacity, technologies and technical stocks," Putin warned.

He also stressed the need to ensure Russian's security.

"Military and industrial potential is huge as we have well-trained scientific personnel. Many of the things we had have been updated considerably, ensuring us that we will be able to protect ourselves with existing resources," Putin said. (Xinhua)