Kremlin says it is still waiting for U.S. response to Putin's nuclear treaty offer

MOSCOW: Russia is still waiting for the United States to respond to President Vladimir Putin's proposal to informally extend for a year the provisions of the last remaining nuclear arms pact between the two countries, the Kremlin said on Thursday.

AI Brief

Russia awaits U.S. response on President Putin's proposal to extend nuclear arms pact, New START treaty.
Expiry of treaty on February 5 may cause a significant gap in legal framework for regulating nuclear arms.
New START, signed in 2010, imposes limits on strategic weapons deployment and warhead numbers between the two countries.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the expiry of the New START treaty on February 5 could lead to a serious gap in the legal framework regulating nuclear arms.

New START, which was signed by presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev in 2010, sets limits on the strategic weapons that each side would use to target the other's critical political and military centres in the event of a nuclear war.

It caps the number of deployed strategic warheads at 1,550 on each side, with no more than 700 deployed ground- or submarine-launched missiles and bomber planes to deliver them.