United States Announced Arms Control Negotiations with Russia

The United States is ready to begin arms control negotiations with Russia. Robert O’Brien, Assistant to the President of the United States for National Security announced during a briefing, C-SPAN reports. “Soon we begin negotiations on arms control and nuclear issue, which are important for the security of all countries, not only the United States and Russia,” he said. O’Brien added that Washington plans to continue “confronting” Russia when necessary, but negotiations will be held at the same time. In August last year, the United States withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Missile Treaty (INF Treaty), which limited the characteristics of produced missiles. The reason for this, according to Washington, was the development of the 9M729 missile in Russia. The Russian side, in turn, opposed the deployment of Mk-41 launchers in Romania. After withdrawing from the agreement, two tests with missiles were conducted and that violated the agreement. Both missiles flew over 500 km. Russia and the United States still have an offensive arms reduction treaty (SART-3) which remains the only current arms limitation treaty and expires in February 2021.