Putin urges Obama to halt missile shield plan
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Nov. 24 urged U.S. president-elect Barack Obama to drop the planned U.S. missile shield in Eastern Europe, warning of an "adequate response" from Moscow.
"This project is aimed against the strategic potential of Russia. And we can only give it an adequate response," Putin said at a conference on human rights law in Saint Petersburg. But he added: "If there are not missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic - there will be no retaliatory measures either."
Obama, who takes office on January 20, has yet to give firm details over whether he intends to continue the plan which was created by the outgoing administration of Republican President George W. Bush.
Putin said that if the new Obama administration was prepared to drop the plan, then "by itself, the question of our retaliatory measures would be dropped."
"Then we can break the dangerous, negative trend on the European continent," he said.
He warned that if the missile shield was built, "it is clear that the one who loses, above all, is Europe."
Earlier this month Moscow raised alarm in Western capitals by warning it could place missiles in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, close to Poland, in response to the plan.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said at the weekend that while the Bush administration's position looked "extremely inflexible" then "the position of the president-elect looks more careful."
Russia has repeatedly expressed fury over U.S. plans to place a missile defence radar system in the Czech Republic and linked interceptor missiles in Poland.
In a candid interview with the Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov did not directly comment on the missile shield but said he expected no major changes under Obama.
"The inertia of American foreign policy is a reality on which the whole world has to count," he said.
"I do not expect a miracle and still less hasty decisions on the questions that are important for us."
He was also downbeat on the chances of a change if speculation is confirmed that former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton becomes Barack Obama's secretary of state.
The holders of such posts "are members of an elite who by definition and in their relations with Russia can only be linked to policies which to a large extent do not suit Russia," he said.
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