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Americans fear that Russian warheads will not be put in storehouses
The USA wants to get greater access to Russia’s nuclear armament pro-grams to control warhead reduction provided by a recently concluded treaty on reduction of strategic offensive potentials. This was reported by US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at a session of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Associated Press informs.

The Committee touched upon Russian nuclear weapons because of pos-sible ratification of the treaty signed by George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin in Moscow in May. Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Committee says, the treaty is likely to be ratified by the Senate.

However, as Levin mentions, the Senate is so much alarmed about the fact that the treaty allows Russia not liquidate warheads, but keep them in storage. An AP observer says, the treaty contains no measures for control over its implementation. Is it really so? If this fact is so much astonishing for the US Senate, I really feel sorry for them. The Russia-USA summit took place in May, however, it seems that the Senate has realized it just now.

On the contrary, it was Russia that insisted that a procedure of control over utilized warheads was to be included in the treaty. This was finally done, by mutual consent of both parties.

What do we have as of now? First of all, the treaty was signed. Second, amount of warheads for reduction is fixed: 1,700-2,200 for each side. Third, the parties may keep warheads in storage, not destroy them. It is not the best variant for Russia, by the way, however, not the worst ei-ther, as the nuclear parity is still in force. And finally, the treaty is very short, it is on three and a half pages, as Americans wanted it to be. But the treaty is supplied with supplements on many pages, as Russia wanted. The supplement almost completely repeats the START-1 of 1991 and specifies procedures of mutual control in detail. What is the Senate troubled by then? Dmitry Litvinovich PRAVDA.Ru

Translated by Maria Gousseva

Read the original in Russian: http://www.pravda.ru/main/2002/07/26/44746.html

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