Moscow to ‘retaliate’ against US over treaty

Russia holds missile drills

MOSCOW, Sept 27, (Agencies): Russia will retaliate against the United States in a row over a treaty that allows both states to conduct military observation flights over each other’s territory, Russia’s deputy foreign minister said, Russian news agencies reported on Wednesday.

In the latest sign of escalating tensions between the two countries, the United States has accused Russia of flouting the so-called Open Skies Treaty, an agreement designed to build confidence between the two countries’ militaries, and said it plans to take measures against Moscow.

The Wall Street Journal newspaper reported on Tuesday that would include restricting Russian military flights over American territory in response to what it said was Moscow preventing US observation flights over its heavily militarised Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad.

Russian news agencies cited Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov on Wednesday as saying that Moscow was itself unhappy about Washington’s compliance with the same treaty and would take its own measures against the United States in response to any new US restrictions.

“I have no doubt there will be a (Russian) response,” agencies cited Ryabkov as telling reporters.

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The Russian military on Tuesday test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile and also launched drills involving missile units in Siberia.

The Defense Ministry said a Topol ICBM was launched from the Kapustin Yar launch facility in southwestern Russia, and its practice warhead successfully hit a designated target at the Sary-Shagan firing range in Kazakhstan. The ex-Soviet neighbors have close economic and military ties.

The ministry said the missile test was part of efforts to develop new technologies for piercing missile defenses, but gave no specifics.

Russia long has voiced concern about NATO’s US-led missile defense plans, which it described as a threat to its security, and pledged to deploy weapons capable of penetrating it.

In a separate development, the military also launched large-scale maneuvers in Siberia involving the Yars missile launchers along with support vehicles. It said 4,000 troops will be involved.

The Yars, the most advanced nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles in the Russian military arsenal, is mounted on a heavy truck, making it more difficult for an enemy to spot and destroy it. The ministry said the exercise will involve the missiles’ deployment and feature action to protect them from enemy scouts and precision strikes.

MOSCOW: A Russian court on Wednesday sentenced a prominent Crimean Tatar leader to two years in prison for his criticism of the Crimean Peninsula’s annexation from Ukraine by Russia.

After Crimea was seized in 2014, Russia passed a law making it illegal to question or dispute the annexation.

A court in the Russia-occupied Crimea on Wednesday sentenced Ilmi Umerov, former deputy chairman of the Crimean Tatars’ Mejlis representative body, to two years in prison for comments he made about the annexation on television. Crimea’s Supreme Court effectively banned the Mejlis in April, declaring it an extremist organization.

His lawyers say the 60-year-old Umerov has diabetes and Parkinson’s disease.