Statement of President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin
The Kremlin,
Moscow,
November
13, 2000
At the juncture
of two millennia the world has reached a crucial frontier in the matter
of nuclear disarmament, the nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction
and the ensuring of strategic stability. Over the recent period there
have been indisputable achievements here: exceptionally responsible decisions
were adopted by the participants of the NPT Review Conference, an informative
dialogue on disarmament issues took place at the Millennium Summit in
New York, and the First Committee of the General Assembly of the United
Nations endorsed a number of important resolutions. Russia also has made
its contribution, having ratified the Treaty on the Further Reduction
and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (START-2), the package of the
New York 1997 understandings with respect to antimissile defense, and
the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. In the international community
there has taken shape a consensus that there should be no pause in nuclear
disarmament, and that the disarmament process should be intensified. Radical
progress in this direction is really called for.
Russia is
ready for this.
We see no
grounds that would hinder further deep reductions in strategic offensive
arms. As is known, we have suggested to the U.S., including at the highest
level, that the attainment of radically decreased levels of our countries'
nuclear arsenals - down to 1,500 warheads for each country - should be
set as an objective, which can quite feasibly be reached by the year 2008.
But neither is this the limit - we are ready subsequently to consider
even lower levels. We agree with the view being expressed in the United
States that for the achievement of this agreement it will not be necessary
to conduct protracted negotiations and to start it all from scratch -
we have accumulated considerable experience, and there are juridical mechanisms
under START-1 and START-2. We hope that the Senate of the United States
will follow the example of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation
and complete the ratification of the START-2 Treaty and the ABM-related
understandings. But the main thing now is for Russia and the U.S. to start
without delay moving together or in parallel towards radically reduced
ceilings on nuclear warheads.
That goal
should be achieved in conditions of the preservation and strengthening
of the 1972 ABM Treaty. We are told that the situation in the world has
changed significantly in the past three decades as new missile threats
have arisen which allegedly require corresponding changes in the ABM Treaty.
The situation has indeed changed, but not to such an extent as to warrant
breaking the existing system of strategic stability by emasculating the
ABM Treaty. Measures to counteract the spread of missiles and missile
technologies can be taken without going beyond the framework of the ABM
Treaty and acting primarily by political and diplomatic methods. A vivid
example is the intensive dialogue between the USA and the DPRK on the
problems of missiles. Ways to improve the political and legal mechanisms
of missile non-proliferation are being actively discussed in multilateral
format, work is underway to develop a new code of conduct in this field
and to create a Global System of Missile and Missile Technology Control.
For the countries
which raise the question of a military-technical "safety net"
we offer broad cooperation in the sphere of theater missile defense that
fits into the ABM Treaty. The technological developments for that already
exist. The Moscow Center on Missile Launch Data Exchange now being created
by Russia and the US which must in future be open for all the interested
countries could provide an element of such cooperation. We have already
invited European and other representatives to join this work. I hope that
the new US leadership will not object to the such use of the Center in
the interests of strengthening regional and global stability.
Russia is
ready, without a pause, to continue the dialogue with the US on the issues
of the ABM over which we differ, a dialogue started more than a year ago.
The obligation to consider all the issues affecting the ABM Treaty is
contained in the Treaty itself. Accordingly, we are open to the continuation
of such a discussion within the Permanent Advisory Commission, a negotiating
forum which has been functioning successfully under the Treaty since 1973,
and if necessary, agree on upgrading the level of representation of the
parties in the Commission.
The implementation
of a pragmatic and long-overdue program in the field of real nuclear disarmament
proposed by Russia will make it possible to really strengthen strategic
stability and international security on the threshold of the new 21st
century.
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