WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The United States and Russia exchanged allegations that the other is in noncompliance with the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, US Under Secretary of State for Arms Control Rose Gottemoeller and Russian ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak said in remarks.
“The way it is presented to us is we Russians need to know better as to where we violate the [INF] Treaty. We do not,” Kislyak said on Wednesday during a nuclear deterrence summit in Washington DC. “The Treaty itself is inconcrete. It’s not easy to locate the point where the Americans want us to focus.”
Questioned about Kislyak’s reference to the INF Treaty as “inconcrete,” Gottemoeller stated that the United States has been very specific about where they believe Russia is in violation of the treaty.
Gottemoeller stated that Russia has developed and tested a ground-launched cruise missile “in contravention” of the INF Treaty, adding that the US Department of State has been “very clear about providing additional details” regarding the alleged violation.
“Our view is we have provided more than sufficient information for the Russian Federation to know exactly what ground-launched cruise missile we are talking about,” Gottemoeller said.
Ambassador Kislyak noted that INF compliance remains an area where there are significant differences between the Russian and US outlook.
The United States and the Soviet Union signed the INF Treaty in 1988 banning nuclear and conventional ground-based cruise and ballistic missiles with a range of 310 miles (498km) to 3417 miles (5499km).
Beginning in July 2014, the United States announced Russia had violated the treaty by testing a prohibited ground-launched cruise missile, according to the US State Department. Russia has denied the US claim, pointing, in turn, to US INF violations.
