You're reading: Lavrov, Kerry discuss implementation of INF Treaty

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry discussed arms control aspects in a telephone conversation proposed by the U.S. on July 29.

“An exchange of opinions on problems of arms control was discussed,
including in the context of the implementation by the parties of the
Treaty on the Elimination of their Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Ranger
Missiles,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

The New York Times reported on Tuesday that U.S. President Barack
Obama had informed Russian President Vladimir Putin in a letter on
Monday that, by testing a new cruise missile, Russia was violating the
provisions of the said treaty, known also as the Intermediate-range
Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty). The newspaper said Obama
“underscored his interest in a high-level dialogue with Moscow with the
aim of preserving the 1987 treaty and discussing steps the Kremlin might
take to come back into compliance.”

The U.S. has claimed that Russia has been testing a new
ground-launched cruise missile in violation of the INF Treaty since
2008. The U.S. notified its NATO allies of Moscow’s possible violation
of the treaty back in early 2014.

The INF Treaty, which was signed by U.S. President Ronald Reagan and
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987, forbids the signatories to
possess, produce, or fight-test ground-launched cruise missiles with a
range capability of 500 to 5,500 kilometers.

The treaty was fully implemented by June 1991. The Soviet Union
destroyed 1,846 and the U.S. 846 such systems. In particular, the Soviet
Union disposed of the OTR-22, Temp-S, RSD-10 Pioner, R-12, and R-14
missiles. The U.S. also insisted on the destruction of the OTR-23 Oka
missiles, although its range capability of 50 to 400 kilometers did not
formally fell under the treaty. The U.S. destroyed Pershing-1A,
Pershing-2, and BGM-109 Tomahawk missiles.