MOSCOW: Russia intends to reach an “acceptable” arms reduction agreement with the U.S., Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on the eve of Moscow nuclear talks.
A team of U.S. negotiators led by Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller is to take part the first two-day round of official U.S.-Russian talks on a replacement for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which is set to expire on December 5, 2009.
The top Russian diplomat said that Russia expected “a fruitful exchange of views and approaches,” allowing the two countries to come to “mutually acceptable agreements.”
Lavrov also said the issue of Washington’s plan for a missile shield system in Central Europe was also likely to be discussed during the talks.
The Strategic Arms Reductions Treaty (START 1), signed in 1991, obliges Russia and the United States to reduce nuclear warheads to 6,000 and their delivery vehicles to 1,600 each. In 2002, a follow-up agreement on strategic offensive arms reduction was concluded in Moscow. The agreement, known as the Moscow Treaty, envisioned cuts to 1,700-2,200 warheads by December 2012.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his U.S. counterpart, Barack Obama, agreed during their London meeting in early April on an immediate start to talks on a new strategic arms reduction treaty.
