Reagan Trying to Kill SALT II Provisions ‘One by One’: Soviets
The Soviet Union accused President Reagan today of trying to destroy the SALT II treaty provisions “one by one,” despite his decision to continue honoring the unratified accord.
After a day of studying Reagan’s decision to scrap a nuclear submarine to conform with the treaty’s provisions, official Soviet spokesman Vladimir Lomeiko called an unusual evening news conference to read a formal condemnation.
The statement said that despite Reagan’s decision, U.S. authorities are “furiously deciding how to put an end to the treaty” and that Reagan’s goal is “straightforward abandonment and rejection” of the 1979 accord.
After finishing the statement, Lomeiko added that by simultaneously accusing the Soviet Union of violating the accord, the United States is trying to prepare public opinion in the West for cancellation of the accord that was signed in 1979 but never ratified by the U.S. Senate.
Reagan wants “to prepare for the U.S. relinquishing the treaty--the complete and total relinquishing--by using slamming tactics to destroy the provisions of the treaty one by one and at the same time hiding his own violations,” Lomeiko said.
“They want to destroy that treaty,” he said.
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