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Russia Says U.S. Silence on Last Nuclear Treaty May Be ‘Fatal’

Russia Says U.S. Silence on Last Nuclear Treaty May Be ‘Fatal’

(Bloomberg) -- Calls on Donald Trump to start talks about the last remaining nuclear weapons agreement between Russia and the U.S. remain unanswered, 18 months before it expires, increasing the risk of an unhindered arms race, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman.

The consequences will be “quite fatal” if Russia and the U.S. let lapse the 2010 New START treaty limiting both nuclear powers’ strategic arsenals, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on a call with reporters Monday. “Undoubtedly, strategic stability on the overall global level will be affected, because we all -- I mean humanity -- we will be left without a single document that would regulate this area.”

The New START treaty is due to expire in February 2021. The U.S. conducted a flight test of a new intermediate-range cruise missile Aug. 18 after earlier in the month pulling out of the INF treaty with Russia that barred such tests or deployment of the technology.

The collapse of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces accord “inevitably” undermines the New START treaty as well as the international Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Putin said Aug. 5. “Such a scenario means the resumption of an unrestrained arms race,” he said.

Russia has said previously that it’s ready to discuss extending New START for another five years. Putin said he and Trump agreed during their meeting at the Group of 20 summit in Japan in June to order talks on the issue between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ilya Arkhipov in Moscow at iarkhipov@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Gregory L. White at gwhite64@bloomberg.net, Torrey Clark, Tony Halpin

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