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Disarmament Documentation

US-Russia Arms Control Discussions, April 23

Note: the talks had been scheduled to take place over two days, April 23-24. According to Russian government sources quoted by the Interfax news agency in Moscow on April 23: "They managed to discuss the entire range of issues in one day instead of two". On April 24, the agency quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Valery Loshchinin as stating that the discussions were "not proceeding very easily… Several fundamentally important problems still need to be overcome." (See US Negotiator leaves Russia talks, Associated Press, April 24.)

Russian Foreign Ministry Statement

'On Russian-American Talks', Russian Foreign Ministry Statement, Document 827-23-04-2002, April 23.

The fourth round of Russian-American talks on the preparation, by the Russia-USA summit in May, of an agreement on subsequent cuts in strategic offensive arms and of a declaration of new strategic relations between the two countries started on April 23 in Moscow. The Russian delegation is headed by Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Georgy Mamedov, and the American by Under Secretary of State John Bolton.

A constructive, substantive exchange of views, for solution of questions still outstanding, took place. The Russian side emphasized the importance of reaching a legally binding agreement which would provide for real and verifiable cuts in strategic offensive arms, down to the level of 1,700-2,200 strategic nuclear warheads, reflect the organic link between strategic defensive and offensive arms, enhance the predictability of the development of the strategic situation and strategic stability and rely on the provisions of the operative START I Treaty. It noted, in particular, that the conclusion of a new START Treaty would be a contribution to the fulfillment by our countries of their nuclear disarmament obligations under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

Bolton was received by Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation Sergei Ivanov. The START-ABM talks will be continued under the framework of the upcoming visit of Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Igor Ivanov to the United States early this May.

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Interview with Deputy Foreign Minister George Mamedov

'Transcript of Interview of Deputy Foreign Minister Georgy Mamedov Granted to ORT TV News Program, April 24, 2002', Russian Foreign Ministry transcript.

Question: What are the results of the talks on the strategic offensive weapons? Have the parties managed to reach agreement on the Treaty that the President Putin expects to sign in May?

Mamedov: We have made some progress toward agreeing the text of the treaty. We have a common draft although there are some disagreements still. I listened to the comments of the experts on our talks with some curiosity. But this is a 'look from the outside'. And with your permission I will give you an 'inside look' which is that we did not start these negotiations from scratch and they did not start in January of this year. The thing is that the very important START I Treaty between Russia and the US whereby each side was allowed to have 6,000 warheads is still in force and will be in force until 2009. That Treaty details the reduction procedures and verification procedures and transparency procedures. So, what we are doing now is a comparatively simple document which should complement and not supplement START I Treaty and which will exist in parallel with that Treaty. It facilitates our task somewhat. But I agree with your analysis when you say that it is too soon yet to declare that we will or will not have a treaty because there are still some differences on matters of verifiability of reductions and the mode of reductions.

Question: Reports appeared that there are two or three fundamental problems that have yet to be solved. What are these problems?

Mamedov: The fundamental problems of principle were solved by President of Russia and the USA at their summit last year. And now we face a more modest task which is to seal the agreements reached and translated into the technical language and diplomatic language. What should be the fundamental provisions in the agreement? First, the link between strategic offensive and defensive weapons. We believe so, and so it

was written down in the Statement adopted by our Presidents last year. This is especially important since the ABM Treaty becomes ineffective after June of this year. One of the main understandings reached by the Presidents of Russia and the US at the summit is that the interconnection between strategic offensive weapons and missile defense should be fixed and subsequently reflected in joint documents. This is why we are working simultaneously on a Treaty on the reduction of strategic offensive weapons and on a declaration of new strategic relations between Russia and the US, an important part of which will be devoted to strategic defensive weapons.

The second problem of principle is a real and verifiable reduction down to 1,700-2,200 warheads over the next ten years. And now we are in the process of working out the reduction mechanisms, remembering, I repeat, that both sides have an effective START I Treaty which will be in force until 2009. Both parties have confirmed this.

The third fundamental point is, of course, the mechanism of implementing the new agreement. This is not the task that is to be solved before May, and no such task has been set, contrary to what some experts claim. So, the agreement will continue to develop and be adjusted, just as it happened with START I and ABM treaties. They were always specified, and new understandings and protocols appeared. And this required the creation of an appropriate mechanism.

And finally, another key problem is the future of our strategic relations in new international conditions, what kind of policy we should pursue in the field of strategic stability so that our accords on strategic offensive weapons cuts should strengthen the regimes of non-proliferation, and first of all accords on WMD non-proliferation.

These are the questions we are discussing now. No final agreements have been reached on some of them yet, but we have offered our American colleagues some new ideas. Today the American delegation flew to Washington to work on these new proposals. The US Defense Secretary will make a stopover in Moscow on April 29 to meet with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov. It will be an important contact. And of course Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov's visit to Washington in the beginning of May will be the final stage of negotiations on the documents we are preparing for the summit. In the telephone conversation on April 12, Vladimir Putin and George Bush expressed the hope that the documents would be ready, that they would be sound and allow us to cement the new relations between Russia and the US that we are building now.

Question: I want to return to the Treaty that is now discussed. That document should guarantee irreversibility of nuclear weapons cuts. But some experts claim that all terms of the treaty cannot be fulfilled because some of them are impossible to fulfill technically. In other words, some of the weapons will be destroyed, but some will be stored. Is that really so?

Mamedov: First of all, under all the treaties that we have with the United States in this field, and we are satisfied with this, part of the weapons will be destroyed and part put in storage. There is nothing new or surprising about it. Secondly, I doubt that any of those who comment on the Treaty on which we are now working has seen its text because it is confidential. And in this connection I would like to say that it is a very simple document, there is nothing unrealistic about it and both parties will be able to comply with everything that we are going to put into it. The only question is how sound the guarantees of reductions will be during the 10 years when the Treaty will be in effect. This is what we are currently working on. This is probably the main problem. We have more than 30-year experience of conducting negotiations, concluding agreements, exercising control and verification, reducing strategic offensive weapons. This is why we have reasons to hope that we will be able to verify and fulfill any treaty that our Presidents decide to sign.

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