MOSCOW, July 20 (UPI) — Russian media reported that Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reacted with surprise to the State Department’s recent statements that the United States does not intend to limit its plan to establish anti-ballistic missile defense systems in Europe.
To the foreign ministry, this contradicts comments made by U.S. President Barack Obama during the early months of his presidency, in which he said the U.S. “would go go forward” with the missile defense system “as long as the threat from Iran persists. If the Iranian threat was eliminated, “the driving force for missile defense construction would be removed.”
In light of the Iranian nuclear agreement last week by the P5+1 group of international mediators, Lavrov — and many Russian geopolitical experts — recalled Obama’s comments on giving up plans to construct a missile defense system in Europe.
The U.S. State Department argued said that there was not a direct link between the Iranian deal and missile defense in Europe, Russia Beyond the Headlines reported. The U.S. State Department spokesman said, “the successful resolution of the nuclear issue does not eliminate the need for (creating) missile to counter the Iranian missile threat,” because Iran has the largest stock of ballistic missiles in the Middle East.
In September, 2009, the Obama administration nixed previous plans to station a radar facility in the Czech Republic and 10 ground-based interceptors in Poland. It was subsequently replaced with a phased plan known as the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System, which included the SM-3 Block IIA interceptors to be positioned in Poland beginning in 2018. Poland voiced their concerns about the cancellation and had fear that they lost their special status in Washington. They said they felt it was a move to appease Moscow.
Then-Russian president Dmitry Medvedev welcomed the news positively, however. “We value the U.S. president’s responsible approach toward implementing our agreements,” he said in a televised statement. Putin also called the plan as “correct and brave.”
In what the Kremlin views as a reversal of previous statements made by the Obama administration, Alexander Grushko, Russian envoy to NATO, recently told RIA Novosti that he was surprised by “how easily Washington was renouncing its earlier approaches.”
In early July, news reports described that the Russian military unit will be testing the Iskander ballistic missile near the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, as reported by International Business Times.
Meanwhile, the U.N. Security Council unanimously endorsed the Iran nuclear deal on Monday.
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