Russia and the United States failed to gap their differences over the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in their latest round of arms control talks in Moscow.

The Russian side, in its talks with visiting US Assistant Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, reaffirmed its basic position on the ABM treaty, stating that the country rejects all attempts to undermine this treaty, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a communique Thursday, the Interfax news agency reported.

Talbott, who arrived here Tuesday on a three-day official visit, held talks with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov.

In a related development, a top Russian Defense Ministry official said Thursday that the Russian military were not involved in any "substantial consultations" with the US on revising the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty.

Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov, head of the ministry's foreign military cooperation department, told reporters in Belgrade that those consultations were of a routine character and did not address military and technical aspects related to any ABM treaty revision, Interfax reported.

Ivashov was accompanying Russian Defense Ministry Igor Sergeyev on an official visit to Yugoslavia.

He was critical of Talbott's statement made in Moscow alleging that progress in that field had been achieved.

"Washington insists an ABM continental system be set up, even though this is in violation of the 1972 treaty, and we cannot agree to it. And that is from where one should proceed from," he said.

Russia continues to insist that the ABM Treaty is the basis for the entire system of strategic arms reductions, and any attempts to make amendments to it or back out of it "will destroy the system and bring about difficult consequences not only for Russia and the US, but the entire world," Ivashov said.