US ready to extend nuclear pact

Washington negotiator cites deal in principle, but Moscow rejects terms

WASHINGTON — The United States said on Tuesday it had reached an agreement in principle with Russia to extend New START, the last major nuclear treaty still in force, but Moscow quickly rejected the US’ conditions.

The treaty limits the US and Russia to 1,550 nuclear warheads each and expires on Feb 5.

With three weeks to go before the Nov 3 US presidential election in which US President Donald Trump is trailing in polls, the administration indicated it would support preserving the treaty for an unspecified period.

“We are in fact willing to extend the New START treaty for some period of time provided that they, in return, agree to a limitation — a freeze — on their nuclear arsenal,” US negotiator Marshall Billingslea said.

“We believe that there is an agreement in principle at the highest levels of our two governments,” he said at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.

On Friday, a person familiar with the talks said US and Russian negotiators have agreed in principle to continue freezing their nuclear warhead stockpiles.

The person said Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin had signed off on the freeze, but negotiators still need to iron out details, including compliance and verification issues. The person spoke to reporters after the last round of USRussia arms control talks in Helsinki last week.

Billingslea cut short a trip to Asia last week to fly to Helsinki to meet his Russian counterpart in the talks, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, saying that he sensed a breakthrough compromise.

But Ryabkov said that the US demand to freeze nuclear work in the interim was “an unacceptable proposition”.

“If the Americans are in agreement with the documents that we handed them, a deal could even be reached tomorrow,” Ryabkov said.

“But with so many differences, I cannot imagine on what basis our colleagues in Washington are putting out such theories,” he told the RIA Novosti news agency.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has accused Washington of “unilateralism”. He said the New START would likely cease to exist because the conditions the US has put forward for extending it “don’t take into account our interests or the experience of many decades when arms control has existed to mutual satisfaction”.

Full-fledged deal

Russian diplomats have repeatedly emphasized that Moscow considers the limits on launch platforms — missiles, bombers and submarines — much more important than the restrictions on the number of warheads. Russia likely would be unwilling to accept a separate freeze on the number of warheads unless it is part of a fullfledged deal.

But Billingslea said Russia needs to accept US proposals in his “gentlemen’s agreement” with Ryabkov.

“We are ready to strike this deal. We can strike it tomorrow, in fact.

But Moscow is going to have to show the political will to do so as well,” Billingslea said.

Currently, the US envisions a broad cap on nuclear warheads under which the numbers of multiple weapons systems could be adjusted with some flexibility, according to the person.

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, who leads Trump in all major polls, supports extending the New START — which, if that lead holds on election day, would end days after he takes the oath of office.

Biden called the treaty — which was negotiated by fellow Democrat Barack Obama and allows for an extension of up to five years — an “anchor of strategic stability between the United States and Russia”.

Russia, which sees nuclear weapons as a key strategic asset, had 6,375 nuclear warheads at the start of the year, including those that are not deployed, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

The US had 5,800 warheads, according to the institute.