Russia, US Conclude Missile Defense TalksRussia welcomed the US-Russian consultations on the missile defense system that concluded Friday, saying they were rich in content, but left more questions than answers.The US "failed to prove it has a clear understanding of how to resolve international security problems without dismantling defensive architecture that has evolved over the past 30 years," Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said Friday. Moscow believes the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty is at the heart of this architecture, he added. The spokesman, meanwhile, said the consultations "will continue, namely during the visit of Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov to Washington on May 18." A U.S. delegation led by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz held talks earlier Friday with a Russian interdepartmental delegation of leading experts, headed by Yuri Kapralov, director of the Russian Foreign Ministry's security and disarmament department, shortly after their arrival in Moscow. The U.S. team will also meet Deputy Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Trubnikov, Presidential Security Advisor Igor Sergeyev and Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Anatoly Kvashnin before leaving here Friday night. U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, a member of the U.S. delegation, told the press here that Washington regards as a sign of progress the very fact of the beginning of a dialogue on missile defense with Russia after the change of the U. S. administration. Hadley stressed it was the first step in discussing the problem, and the discussion will continue in the coming weeks between the presidents of the two countries. During the "good and thorough" consultations, Hadley said, the U.S. delegation notified Russian about certain questions raised in a recent speech of President George W. Bush on national missile defense plans. Russian representatives in their turn raised several important and serious questions. Speaking at the gathering at the National Defense University on May 1, U.S. President George W. Bush committed the United States to building a missile defense shield against ballistic missile attack, saying the United States must move beyond the constraints of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty with Russia. Russia has been strongly opposed to Bush's missile defense plan, saying it is an attempt by the United States to establish absolute military dominance. |
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