U.S.-Russia Relations Begin to Thaw

Russia and the United States pledged Monday to work constructively on an array of global issues, despite an erosion of mutual trust and deep differences over the war in Chechnya and the U.S. desire to modify a crucial arms control treaty.

“We’ll continue to talk. . . . Hopefully we’ll come to some understanding,” Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told a joint news conference here with her Russian counterpart, Igor S. Ivanov, after the two held six hours of meetings.

While her comments addressed Russia’s refusal to accept American proposals to amend the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, they seemed to apply equally to the issue of Chechnya. Pushing Moscow to seek a political settlement to the brutal conflict there, Albright made as little headway as she did on the ABM controversy.

The two diplomats’ talks took place as Russian military authorities claimed an important battlefield success in Chechnya. Their forces, they said, had captured a key central square in Grozny, the capital of the separatist republic, after weeks of heavy resistance from rebel fighters.

During their talks, Albright and Ivanov discussed the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region in the southern Caucasus, North Korea and the mission of the newly appointed chief U.N. weapons inspector for Iraq, Hans Blix. They also signed two technical agreements on satellite technology protection and a nuclear risk-reduction protocol.

In addition, Ivanov reiterated Russia’s intention to ratify the 1993 START II nuclear arms-reduction treaty.

“The weather in Moscow may be frozen, but the ability of the United States and Russia to achieve progress on important issues clearly is not,” Albright declared.

Although the areas of cooperation are part of a strategy to rebuild the troubled U.S.-Russian relationship quietly through a series of small steps, the far larger differences over Chechnya and arms control could quickly swamp those efforts.

At the news conference, Ivanov underscored Moscow’s strenuous objection to any loosening of conditions in the ABM treaty negotiated between Washington and Moscow during the Cold War’s era of detente 28 years ago, calling the proposed changes “a grave mistake” that would undermine the spirit of the treaty.

The changes would accommodate a proposed national missile defense system that its backers say would protect the United States from a possible limited nuclear missile attack launched by a “rogue” regime such as North Korea. Albright argued unsuccessfully that Russia faces similar threats and that the issue should really be one more area of cooperation.

But Ivanov countered: “We need other answers for dealing with these third countries.”

After her failure to nudge Ivanov on Chechnya, it was Albright’s turn for verbal salvos.

“We’ve made it quite clear that we think there has been an incredible amount of misery injected on the civilian population of Chechnya,” she said. “The humanitarian situation is very bad.”

She accused Russian troops of using excessive force against civilians and of targeting them indiscriminately, then warned that such actions were isolating Russia internationally.

Meanwhile, the Russian forces operating in Grozny announced their success in seizing Minutka Square, a strategic plaza in the center of the city.

While it was unclear whether Russian forces would be able to hold the square, the reported seizure marked the most significant Russian gain in the war since before Christmas.

“This square was the key to the maneuvers of all those forces that defended the city,” Col. Yevgeny Kukarin told Russian television crews after raising the Russian flag atop a building on the plaza. “It is a gateway to all the roads leading up into the mountains.”

Russian officers claimed that separatist Chechen rebels were surrendering by the dozens, although it was unclear how many of those who turned themselves in were actually combatants.

“The situation in Grozny has fundamentally changed,” Maj. Gen. Vladimir Shamanov, deputy commander of Russian forces in Chechnya, told ORT television. “The bandits surrender in panic. And the ranks of those who still try to call themselves Allah’s warriors are melting away right before our eyes.”

Russian officials consistently have underestimated the skill and determination of the Muslim rebels. The Russians have claimed several times to have taken Minutka Square but then have been quickly driven out. The Chechens have said their plan is to draw the Russians into the center of Grozny and then attack them, although rebel commanders have acknowledged that at some point they will be forced to retreat south into the Caucasus Mountains.