Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Russia's bragging about new missiles comparable to return to Cold War status, US State Department says

Putin's statement about Russia's making operational dozens of new intercontinental ballistic missiles contradicts the spirit of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) and causes anxiety in Washington.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said this during a live broadcast at a briefing of the U.S. State Department on Tuesday.

"Of course it concerns me. We have the START agreement. We're trying to move in the opposite direction," the U.S. Secretary of State said, commenting on the Russian president's statement about new ballistic missiles.

Kerry said that in the 90-s the United States had enormous cooperation with respect to the destruction of nuclear weapons at first with the Soviet Union and then with Russia and the countries of the former Soviet Union.

"Nobody wants to see us step backwards. Nobody wants to, I think, go back to a kind of Cold War status," Kerry stressed.

He also noted that the international community wouldn't like to hear "that kind of announcement from the leader of a powerful country," and to be concerned about the implications of this.


As reported, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that this year Russia's nuclear forces would be supplemented with more than 40 new intercontinental ballistic missiles, speaking at the opening of the international military-technical forum "Army 2015" on Tuesday.

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