Arms Control Experts Applaud Announcement of New Nuclear Reductions Treaty with Russia
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 26, 2010
CONTACT: Katie Mounts, Director of External Relations
Washington, D.C. – Today, the Obama Administration announced that negotiations for the text of the most significant nuclear reductions treaty between the United States and Russia in decades are complete. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will sign the agreement on April 8 in Prague, Czech Republic.
“We welcome the announcement of the completion of a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty to reduce the numbers of nuclear weapons in United States and Russia,” said the Center’s Executive Director John Isaacs. “This is a huge step forward in advancing the bipartisan nuclear security agenda that the President outlined in Prague in April 2009 to reduce the dangers posed by nuclear weapons.”
That agenda included three primary objectives: to reduce and eventually eliminate existing nuclear weapons stockpiles, prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons to new states, and prevent nuclear weapons-usable materials from falling into the hands of terrorists. Reductions in the United States and Russia are they key to moving forward on the first goal.
“This agreement demonstrates the Administration’s commitment to moving away from Cold War era stockpiles and reducing the number of nuclear weapons in the two countries that currently possess more than 95% of those remaining in the world,” added Leonor Tomero, the Center’s director of nuclear non-proliferation. “It is a key element of the President’s efforts to effectively address the most pressing threat to the United States: the danger that nuclear weapons might spread to other countries or to terrorists or that a nuclear weapon might be detonated by accident.”
This foreign policy victory builds on the domestic victory of the Administration this week on health care. “A stronger President on health care is a stronger President to move forward this nuclear security agenda,” Isaacs said. “We look for a Senate vote on the treaty this year. The sooner the treaty enters into force, the sooner important verification procedures can be up and running again.”
The Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation is one of the nation’s oldest and largest organizations dedicated to reducing and eventually eliminating nuclear weapons.
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