Russia said today that negotiations on a replacement for the expired Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty could be finished in a matter of weeks, Reuters reported (see GSN, Jan. 25).
(Jan. 27) -
A Russian Topol-M ICBM, displayed during a parade rehearsal outside Moscow last April. Russia today said it could reach agreement with the United States within weeks on a new nuclear arms control treaty (Dmitry Korotayev/Getty Images).
Progress was made last week at high-level meetings in Moscow that involved U.S. national security adviser Gen. James Jones and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen and their Russian equivalents, said Foreign Ministry spokesman Igor Lyakin-Frolov.
"The talks were successful, and as a result we can hope that it will take just a few weeks for negotiators to come up with a document," Lyakin-Frolov said.
Last summer, U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced that they had agreed to reduce their countries' respective stockpiles of deployed strategic nuclear weapons to between 1,500 and 1,675 warheads. The two nations are required under the 2002 Moscow Treaty to each cut its arsenal to no more than 2,200 warheads by 2012.
One thing holding up treaty completion, Lyakin-Frolov suggested, is the matter of telemetry, in which a missile's launch and flight path is monitored from a distance.
Lyakin-Frolov said Washington should consider Moscow's concerns regarding U.S. missile defense activities, though he indicated the new START accord might not cover the matter at great length (see GSN, Jan. 26).
In December, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Washington ought to provide Moscow telemetry on missile defense weaponry if it wants information on Russian strike missiles. That could kill the deal, as the U.S. Senate would not be expected to sign off on a nuclear pact that also dealt significantly with missile defense (Steve Gutterman, Reuters I/Yahoo!News, Jan. 27).
In Washington, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Russian reports of further treaty talks set for Monday in Geneva were true, Agence France-Presse reported.
It is "hard to make any predictions in terms of what a time line is, but I think we're reasonably optimistic that the finish line is within sight," Crowley said (Agence France-Presse/Raw Story, Jan. 26).
The talks have extended for 10 months and continued past the Dec. 5 expiration of the former treaty, Reuters reported. More holdups in negotiations could add to doubts over whether ties between Moscow and Washington have truly been "reset" and potentially hurt the chances for additional weapon reduction decisions. Other nuclear-armed nations and states approaching that capability might also take away the wrong message from such delays, according to the news service.
These worries have contributed to Russia and the United States shooting for a completed treaty before a Global Nuclear Security Summit is held in Washington in April (see GSN, Jan. 20).
In private, some Russian officials are not hopeful that negotiations will finish as quickly as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said.
National political concerns and different strategic nuclear capabilities also pose challenges to the finalization of the treaty.
As Russia's nuclear stockpile could fall below 1,500 in five to six years due to aging warheads, experts say Moscow would like similar constraints put on the United States' arsenal. The Kremlin also wants U.S. nuclear weapon-capable submarines covered in the accord.
Verification protocols are the most contentious issue though, officials say, with Russia calling for something less stringent than what the old START agreement required.
While the expired agreement obligated both countries to share their telemetry information, Moscow felt it received a bad bargain as it supplied the Pentagon with data on new Russian missiles while Washington only disclosed information on old missiles it was refurbishing because it was not developing any new missiles.
Russia is also thought to be concerned that the U.S. Senate might vote to not approve the treaty once it is finalized (Steve Gutterman, Reuters II/Yahoo!News, Jan. 22).