NATO’s top official has announced plans to re-establish contact with Russian military leaders after months of tensions, calling the relations "important".

NATO's top official has announced plans to re-establish contact with Russian military leaders after months of tensions, calling the relations "important".

"We have talked an awful lot about how we re-establish communication and the fact that the communication with our senior military interlocutors in Russia is important," NATO's General Philip Breedlove, who also serves as the Commander of the US European Command, said on Thursday as quoted by Reuters.

Correspondence between the military heads have been tense over Ukrainian crisis. However, according to Breedlove, he has had conversations with General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the general staff of Russia's armed forces, in 2014, even with the relations strained.

"We are going to re-establish that, we have talked among several of us senior military leaders how we will do that ... but yes, we are going to re-establish communication with Valery [Gerasimov]," he said.