Putin: Expiration of pact ‘bad for humanity’
MOSCOW » Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday there were currently no negotiations with the United States on extending a soonto-expire nuclear arms control treaty, raising the risk of a situation that would be “very bad for humanity.”
The New START treaty limits the numbers of deployed nuclear warheads in Russia and the United States and it is set to expire in 2021.
“There are no negotiations on extending it,” Putin said at his an- nual news conference. “It’s not interesting or not needed — fine then.”
Putin has long sought to bring the United States to the table on nuclear arms control talks. Analysts say that’s in part because it’s one of the only international issues in which Moscow and Washington can face each other as equals.
But President Donald Trump and his national security adviser, John Bolton, have expressed skepticism of the existing arms control architecture. Trump has already announced plans to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, or INF Treaty, which bans the United States and Russia from having missiles with a range between 300 and 3,500 miles.
With the likely demise of the INF Treaty, New START will be the last major agreement limiting the world’s two biggest nuclear arsenals. If New START expires, Putin said, “we will ensure our security, we know how to do it. But this is very bad for humanity because it leads us to a very dangerous line.”