NATO, Russia fail to agree over missile breach, US to quit treaty

Foreign military attaches and journalists attend a briefing by the Russian Defense Ministry as the 9M729 land-based cruise missile, right, in Kubinka outside Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2019. (AP)

Russian military officers stand by as the 9M729, center, its launcher, left, and the 9M728, right, land-based cruise missiles are displayed in Kubinka outside Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2019. (AP)

• At a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council in Brussels, envoys from NATO’s 29 members renewed their call on Moscow’s deputy foreign minister to destroy a nuclear-capable cruise missile system before a Feb. 2 deadline
• Russia denies violating the terms of the treaty

BRUSSELS/MOSCOW: NATO and Russia failed on Friday to resolve a dispute over a new Russian missile that Western allies say is a threat to Europe, bringing closer Washington’s withdrawal from a landmark arms control treaty.
At a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council in Brussels, envoys from NATO’s 29 members renewed their call on Moscow’s deputy foreign minister to destroy a nuclear-capable cruise missile system before a Feb. 2 deadline.
Without a breakthrough, the United States is set to start the six-month process of pulling out of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), having notified it would do so in early December and accusing Moscow of breaching it.
Russia denies violating the terms of the treaty, which eliminated the medium-range missile arsenals of the world’s two biggest nuclear powers.
“The treaty is in real jeopardy,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said. “The sooner Russia comes back into compliance, the better. The treaty has no value if it is not respected, the problem are the Russian missiles in Europe,” he told a news conference after the meeting.
One NATO diplomat said the US ambassador to the alliance told the assembled diplomats and officials that Washington would start the pull-out process from the INF on Feb. 2. The US embassy was not immediately available for comment.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told the closed-door meeting that it was the United States that was breaching the treaty, alliance diplomats said.
Ryabkov, who spoke in both Russian and English, cited the US-built NATO missile defense system in Romania as a treaty breach. NATO says the shield is designed to shoot down rockets from Iran, not from Russia.
Separately, the Russian foreign ministry also accused the United States of reviving a Cold War-era plan to deploy a missile defense system in space.
While NATO diplomats described Friday’s meeting as calm and professional, Stoltenberg said Russia had shown no willingness to compromise. But he and some European nations such as Germany held out hope for diplomatic progress during the six-month withdrawal process.