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Russia may halt arms cuts

Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW: The proposed deployment of U.S. missile defences in Eastern Europe may derail ongoing arms cuts and will trigger an uncontrollable arms race, warned Russia's top military official.

"I do not rule out that the new situation will require Russia to review its thinking on the further reductions of not only strategic, but also other types of weapons," said Chief of the General Staff General Yuri Baluyevsky.

"I think the deployment of U.S. missile defences in Europe will set off a new round of uncontrollable arms race," Gen. Baluyevsky writes in the Rossiyskaya Gazeta on Friday.

The General accused the U.S. of "methodically destroying" international mechanisms of arms control and disarmament, citing the U.S. withdrawal from the anti-ballistic missile treaty and the new U.S. nuclear doctrine, which lowered the nuclear arms threshold.

Moscow has dismissed U.S. claims that the planned deployment of missile interceptors in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic was designed to counter missile threats from Iran and North Korea.

Russia has already frozen its commitments under the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty until NATO ratifies the pact.

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