Kremlin: American anti-missile systems in Romania pose a threat to Russia
The United States’ deployment of missile launch systems at the anti-missile defense base in Romania violates the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, Georgiy Borisenko, Director of the North America Department of the Russian Foreign Ministry, told RIA Novosti in an interview.
He noted that the US “has been making such claims against us for four years already, but they have presented no real evidence that we are violating anything anywhere”. “Only some pictures from Google Earth, which supposedly depict several launch systems on the ground. But everything is very blurry, and it is completely unclear why it is believed that these systems would fire at a distance which violates the INF Treaty,” the Russian diplomat stated.
Nevertheless, according to him, “[Aegis Ashore] launch systems have already been deployed by the Americans at the anti-missile defense base in Romania for all to see, which, according to their technical characteristics, could launch not only interceptors, but also strike cruise missiles of the Tomahawk type. The deployment of such launching facilities on the ground is prohibited by the INF Treaty. They can only be on ships. We consider what is taking place to be a violation of the INF Treaty, and we regard it as a direct threat to us,” Borisenko emphasized.
“The US is literally surrounding our territory with anti-missile defense systems,” he said.
“They are already in Europe, and they want to send more THAAD systems to South Korea. Additional radars have already been deployed in Japan. Our military specialists understand perfectly well that this is directed against us. And the Americans don’t make any special effort to hide this, and have stopped referring to the fact that their means of anti-missile defense are supposedly intended solely for eliminating the missile threat from Iran,” the director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s North America department stated.
Earlier, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that Russia has violated the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the INF Treaty, and has made attempts to weaken the independence of the IAEA.