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Putin Warns Bush Against
"Unilateral" Missile Defense Action
BRDO CASTLE, Slovenia, June 16 (News Agencies) - Russian President Vladimir Putin warned his U.S. counterpart George W. Bush Saturday not to rock the boat on missile defense as a two-hour summit here failed to narrow their differences on the issue, Western news agencies said.
Putin conceded the jovial mood that saw the two leaders bask in mutual admiration at their first-ever meeting had failed to dispel Russian opposition to U.S. plans to build a missile shield.
"Differences in approaches do exist and naturally in one short moment, it is very difficult to overcome all of them," Putin said, adding that Russia and the United States had a duty not to jeopardize global security by acting unilaterally.
Washington wants to construct a missile shield that would effectively lead to the collapse of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which Putin called "a cornerstone of the modern architecture of international security."
The Russian leader added that the missile dispute had been "one of the central topics" of the summit, but despite the friendly atmosphere of the talks -- and a shared recognition of the altered realities of the post-Cold War world, differences remained.
"Russia and the United States are not enemies. They do not threaten each other, and they can be fully good allies.
"But taking into account the fact that, as no other countries in the world, they have accumulated huge amounts of nuclear weapons, weapons of mass destruction, we bear a special responsibility for maintaining the common peace and security in the world," Putin said.
"Any unilateral actions can only make more complicated the various problems and issues," the Russian president said in a veiled warning to his American counterpart not to ignore Moscow's qualms about the missile shield.
The Kremlin boss said he and Bush had exchanged "frank and confidential" views on approaches to international security.
"It was very important for me to hear how and what the president of the United States thinks -- and to hear it directly from him," Putin said.
Questioned by the French news wire AFP, a top Kremlin aide had earlier said that Russia's position on the 1972 treaty had "not changed."
"But we are looking for a stable and constructive relationship with the United States, and that is why the Ljubljana summit is so important, because it is an opportunity to open a political dialogue, the beginning of contacts with the new U.S. administration.
"The agreement on ABM has worked up until now and has guaranteed strategic stability. That's what we are saying, just because you are building a new house, there's no need to destroy the old one," the aide said.
Earlier this week, Bush called the 30-year-old treaty a "relic of the past" and claimed the missile shield was necessary to protect the United States from what the U.S. calls rogue states such as North Korea, Libya and Iran, in reference to their policies that differ from the Washington's.
Despite U.S. assurances that anti-missile defense is aimed at a new generation of post Cold War threats, Russia has warned that the ABM treaty's demise could spark a new arms race.
In addition to missile defense, the two leaders also raised other divisive issues such as Russian weapons' proliferation and NATO expansion into Eastern Europe.
Russia has bristled at the idea of its former Warsaw Pact allies -- and even former Soviet republics -- joining the Alliance. The nine official candidates seeking admittance at a NATO summit in Prague next year are Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Albania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
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