Stress –
The United States and Russia have stopped sharing information about nuclear weapons under the New STARTS nuclear treaty, the latest arms control treaty between the two nations, US officials said Tuesday.
The White House, Pentagon and State Department officials said the United States had continued to provide its information to Russia, even after President Vladimir Putin suspended his country’s participation in the alliance last month, but Moscow told Washington it would no longer share.
“Due to Russia’s non-compliance with these treaty obligations, the United States does not even provide its semi-annual data to Russia, in order to encourage Russia to comply with the treaty,” said Vedant Patel, a spokesman for the State Department.
The White House, which has previously accused Russia of multiple New START violations, said Moscow’s rejection of the accord “lacks legal validity” and that the decision to withhold nuclear information represents another violation.
Although shortly after President Joe Biden took office in January 2021, Russia attempted a New START war in Ukraine, which more than a month since Putin’s death had announced that Russia would no longer meet his demands.
New START, signed by then Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitri Medvedev in 2010, required each country to deploy a maximum of 1,550 nuclear warheads and 700 missiles and bombers. The agreement includes inspections to verify compliance.
These inspections have not been done since 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. There were talks of a resumption in November 2022, but Russia abruptly canceled them, citing US support for Ukraine. Moscow officially suspended its league in February.
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Associate writer Josh Boak contributed to this report.
