Moscow has postponed a round of nuclear arms control talks with the United States set for this week because of stark differences in approach and tensions over Ukraine, a senior Russian diplomat said Tuesday.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said the decision to put off the talks that were scheduled to start Tuesday in Cairo was made at the political level. The postponement marked another low point in badly strained U.S.-Russian relations and raised concerns about the future of the last remaining nuclear arms control pact between the two powers.
"We faced a situation when our U.S. Colleagues not just demonstrated their reluctance to listen to our signals and reckon with our priorities, but also acted in the opposite way,” Ryabkov told reporters in Moscow.
Ryabkov claimed the U.S. Wanted to focus solely on resuming inspections under the New START treaty and stonewalled Moscow's request to also discuss specifics related to the weapons count under the strategic arms reduction pact.
This week's meeting of the Bilateral Consultative Commission established under the treaty would have been the first in more than a year. The timing of the talks was intended to show that Russia and the U.S. Remain committed to arms control and keeping lines of communication open despite soaring tensions over Ukraine.