the Us military plans openly aimed at deterring Russia and China, said the Russian Ambassador in Washington Anatoly Antonov in an interview with TASS. “We proposes the concept of the rivalry of the great powers, in fact we are talking about the arms race,” he said and stressed that the Russian side would like to avoid such developments.
At the same time Antonov said that Russia’s national security will not suffer damage in the event of a US withdrawal from the Treaty on reduction of strategic offensive arms (start Treaty). And if the US decides not to renew the agreement, that Russia’s reaction will be “calm, thoughtful, balanced”.
Antonov also told about the preparation of the meeting, Deputy foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and the special representative of the President of the United States arms control Marshall Billingsley on strategic stability. The meeting will take place in Vienna and the preparation for it is “virtually complete”, said the diplomat and expressed thanks to the Austrian colleagues, who helped to create the conditions for a fruitful conversation. He said that delegations of Russia and the USA will be interdepartmental. The focus of both parties is the issue of arms control. Perhaps the theme will be expanded to the issues of strategic stability. Antonov said that Russia had a lot of questions to our American partners regarding their plans and actions to change the architecture of strategic security.
Previously, the state Department announced that Billingsley will hold talks with Ryabkov on June 22-23. China sent an invitation to join the debate.