Negotiators for the United States and Russia plan to launch talks tomorrow aimed at rolling back their nations' nuclear arsenals, Reuters reported (see GSN, March 17).
(Apr. 23) -
Russian Foreign Ministry security and disarmament chief Anatoly Antonov is set to represent Moscow in arms reduction talks set to begin tomorrow with the United States (Dieter Nagl/Getty Images).
The countries agreed this month to begin negotiations on a follow-up agreement for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, which expires in December.
This week's meetings in Rome will be led by Russian Foreign Ministry security and disarmament chief Anatoly Antonov and U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Verification and Compliance Rose Gottemoeller. The two are well acquainted, officials said (Conor Sweeney, Reuters, April 23).
Their bosses, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, are scheduled to discuss nuclear nonproliferation during a May 7 meeting in Washington, the Associated Press reported (Associated Press/Washington Post, April 23).
Negotiators hope to have made notable progress toward an agreement by the time Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev meet in July in Moscow, Reuters reported (Sweeney, Reuters).
Moscow is open to a deal with Washington that would "significantly" reduce Russian nuclear holdings, possibly below mandates set by the 2002 Moscow Treaty, Gen. Nikolai Makarov, head of the Russian General Staff, told Interfax.
"The Russian president, the commander in chief, voiced this position in Helsinki. That's why I believe we are able to significantly cut both the warheads and their carriers," he said, according to Agence France-Presse (see GSN, April 21).
The Moscow Treaty permits each side to maintain between 1,700 and 2,000 operationally deployed nuclear warheads. Both nations also keep a considerable number of weapons in storage (Agence France-Presse/Spacewar.com, April 23).
"The new treaty on strategic offensive weapons could reduce the number of warheads possessed by each country to 1,500," said Vladimir Dvorkin, a retired major general who now conducts research at the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Arms Control Association analyst Greg Thielmann suggested that the number might be even lower under a new agreement.
The countries should avoid linking the treaty negotiations with a U.S. plan to field missile interceptors and a radar station in Europe, Theilmann said (see GSN, April 22). Russia has long opposed the missile shield plan, and Dvorkin said the two issues are related (Interfax, April 22).