World

Russia 'halts missile deployment'

by Dave Keating | January 28, 2009 at 12:10 am

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Russia's Interfax news agency is reporting that Russia will halt its plans to install new missiles in Kaliningrad, its exclave territory located on the Baltic sea within the EU. The move is likely a show of good faith to the new Obama Administration, which Russia hopes will abandon Bush Administration plans to install a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic. Russia has said it sees the missile defense system as a direct threat to Russia.

However the Russian government has yet to confirm the report. This may be a strategy to get the idea out there in the public domain to demonstrate to the Obama Administration that it could quickly ease tensions between the two countries by quashing the missile defense system plan.

Russia's military has announced it will halt its plans to deploy short-range missiles in Kaliningrad, Russia's Interfax news agency has said.

A Russian military official said a change in US attitude had prompted the latest decision, Interfax reported.

President Dmitry Medvedev announced the plan in November last year, saying it was to counteract US plans for an anti-missile shield based in Europe.

Russia had said it saw the US missile shield plan as a direct threat.