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Russia tests new inter-continental ballistic missile

MOSCOW: Russia tested new strategic and tactical missiles on Tuesday, flexing its muscles amid military disputes with the West and bitter opposition to a U.S. plan for a defensive shield in Europe.

First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said Russia tested an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying multiple independent warheads and a tactical cruise missile with an increased range, boasting that the weaons can penetrate any missile defence system.

``As of today, Russia has new tactical and strategic complexes that are capable of overcoming any existing or future missile defence systems,'' Ivanov said, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency. ``So in terms of defence and security, Russians can look calmly to the country's future.''

President Vladimir Putin and Ivanov, a former defence minister seen as a potential Kremlin favorite to succeed Putin next year, repeatedly have said Russia would continue to improve its nuclear arsenal and respond to U.S. plans to deploy a missile defence system in Poland and the Czech Republic _ NATO nations that were in Moscow's front yard during the Cold War as Warsaw pact members.

Russia has bristled over the plans, vocally dismissing U.S. assertions that the system would be aimed at blocking possible attacks by Iran and saying it would destroy the strategic balance of forces in Europe.

``We consider it harmful and dangerous to turn Europe into a powder keg and to fill it with new kinds of weapons,'' Putin said Tuesday at a news conference with Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates. --AP

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