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After both Russia and the US scrapped their respective missiles plans, Moscow and Washington are gearing up to resume the dialogue for the revamping of the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, START -1, which will expire on Dec 5, 2009.
The sixth round of talks on the new nuclear weapons reduction agreement between Russia and the US kicked off on Sep 21 in Geneva.
While Anatoly Antonov, the director of department of security and disarmament of Russia’s foreign ministry, will lead Russian delegation, the US team will be spearheaded by Rose Gottemoeller, the assistant secretary of the state.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and US President Barack Obama, during their meeting in July, had agreed to enter into a new deal and decrease their operational nuclear warheads to 1,500-1,675 and the delivery vehicles to 500-1,000.
There will be four to five rounds of talks between the two nations till the deal is finalised in December. By the Russian President had said on Sunday that the chances that a new deal on the nuclear weapons will be signed by 2009 end are very high.
