NATO urging russia to return to negotitating table after withdrawal from nuclear treaty

NATO called on russia to reconsider its decision to suspend its participation in the START nuclear arms reduction treaty with the United States.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said this during a press conference in Brussels with the participation of Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and EU High Representative for Foreign Policy and Security Josep Borrell, the European Pravda reports.

"I regret the decision by russia to suspend its participation in [the] New START program," Stoltenberg said, noting that in recent years, russia has violated vital arms control agreements.

The Secretary-General stressed that the entire arms control architecture had been destroyed with today's decision on the START treaty. 

"More nuclear weapons and less arms control makes the world more dangerous," Jens Stoltenberg said, urging russia to reconsider its decision. 

"This is one of the last major arms control agreements we have," he said, and "just another example" of a step away from the global rules-based order. 

In his message to the Federal Assembly, russian president vladimir putin announced that russia was suspending its participation in the Treaty on Strategic Offensive Weapons. He also threatened: "If the USA conducts tests (of nuclear weapons – ed.), we will conduct them too."

The Strategic Offensive Weapons Treaty, which was extended for five years in 2021, remains the only valid arms control treaty between russia and the United States.

Signed in 2010 for ten years,  SNV-III limits the strategic carriers and nuclear warheads of russia and the United States to 700 and 1,550, respectively. The contract can be extended for five years in case of goodwill of each of the signatories.

The administration of Donald Trump was not determined to extend the contract. However, his successor, Joe Biden, agreed to continue New START.