Russia, US clash over INF arms treaty at UN

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) — Russia on Friday failed to get the United Nations General Assembly to consider calling on Washington and Moscow to preserve and strengthen an arms control treaty that helped end the Cold War and warned that if the United States quits the pact, it could raise the issue in the UN Security Council.

US President Donald Trump on Oct. 20 said Washington planned to quit the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, which Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader, and Ronald Reagan signed in 1987. It eliminated all short- and intermediaterange land-based nuclear and conventional missiles held by both states in Europe.

Washington has cited Russia’s alleged violation of the treaty as its reason for leaving it, a charge Moscow has denied. Russia, in turn, has accused Washington of breaking the pact.

Russia had proposed a draft resolution in the 193-member General Assembly’s disarmament committee, but missed the Oct. 18 submission deadline. On Friday, it called for a vote on whether the committee should be allowed to consider the draft, but lost with only 31 votes in favor, 55 against and 54 abstentions.

“In a year, if the US withdraws from the treaty and begins an uncontrolled build-up of weapons, nuclear-capable weapons, we will be confronting a completely different reality,” Russia’s Department for Nonproliferation and Arms Control deputy director Andrei Belousov told the committee.