Russia said Wednesday it would study U.S. proposals to resume dialogue on nuclear arms control, but that it would not accept them unless Washington dropped its “hostile” stance towards Moscow.
The U.S. and Russia used to regularly inspect each other’s nuclear facilities and limit warheads under the New START treaty, but Moscow suspended the treaty in February amid tensions over Ukraine.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told Russian news agencies that Moscow had received an informal memo from the U.S. calling for renewed dialogue, but that talks were out of the question for now.
“The (U.S.) suggests putting dialogue on strategic stability and arms control on a systematic footing, doing so in isolation from everything that is going on,” Ryabkov said.
“We are not ready for this,” he added.
“It is simply impossible to return to dialogue on strategic stability, including New START… without changes in the United States’ deeply, fundamentally hostile course towards Russia,” he said.
