Missile Defense Talks With U.S. Planned

Foreign Minister Igor S. Ivanov said Russia will seek serious talks with the U.S. on missile defense, although Russia rejects amending the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty to allow creation of such a system. “We intend to enter into serious dialogue with the new American administration on all complex disarmament problems, including preservation of the 1972 ABM Treaty,” Ivanov wrote in the newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta. President-elect George W. Bush is expected to push for the creation of a national missile defense system.