After Biden-Putin, Moscow hails US common sense on strategic dialogue

 Steph Deschamps / June 17, 2021

Moscow welcomed Thursday the commitment of the Russian and U.S. presidents to a dialogue on strategic security and nuclear disarmament, seeing the United States return to common sense a day after the first summit between the two leaders.

Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden initialed a short text affirming their willingness to establish a dialogue on strategic stability, including on the issue of nuclear arms control, while the United States, under President Donald Trump withdrew from bilateral and multilateral agreements. Even if it is a very short text, it is a joint document on strategic stability that is the particular responsibility of our countries not only to their peoples, but before the whole world, said Dmitry Peskov, spokesman for the Kremlin, on the air of the Echo of Moscow radio. For his part, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Riabkov described the prospect of a dialogue on nuclear disarmament and the rejection of nuclear war as a real success. After the extension in extremis of the New Start disarmament treaty at the beginning of the year by Joe Biden, this is the second step by Washington in the direction of a return to common sense, he said, quoted by the daily Kommersant.

According to him, the dialogue on strategic stability between Russians and Americans must begin soon: It is a matter of weeks, not months. Russia and the United States together still hold more than 90% of the world's nuclear weapons, according to the 2020 report of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri). At the end of their summit in Geneva, Mr. Putin and Mr. Biden judged their dialogue to be constructive, while noting their rivalry and deep differences on a large number of issues. Russian-American relations have been deteriorating for years, raising fears of a new arms race.