December 19, 2007	Wednesday	Zilhaj 8, 1428

RIGA, Dec 18: Russia wants more concrete reasons from Washington as to why it plans to build an anti-missile system in Poland and the Czech Republic, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday.

Speaking after finalising a border agreement with the Baltic state of Latvia, 16 years after the fall of the Soviet Union, Lavrov said written proposals from the US side after meetings in October had lacked elements which had been verbally agreed.

“We hope that the negotiations that we are carrying on would be conducted with mutual respect and not just limited to statements that these (the missile system) are not against Russia,” Lavrov told a news conference.

“We would like them to be a bit more concrete,” he added.

The United States has announced plans for a missile defence system in Central Europe. It wants to station interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar base in the Czech Republic.

It says this will defend it against attacks by “rogue” states and is not aimed at Russia, but Moscow believes the system threatens its security and has promised counter-measures.

Lavrov said Russia was concerned as the plans meant it would be the first time U.S. strategic arms were stationed in Europe.

Lavrov said that in talks in October, when US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice visited Moscow, the US side had made a number of proposals to soothe Russian worries.

These had included the idea of having a permanent monitoring presence at the Polish and Czech sites.

But he said these were absent from written proposals handed by Washington to Moscow in November, where it was said Russians could only visit the areas on invitation from local governments.

Lavrov also said the United States had said during the talks that if there was no threat from Iran, then the system would be dismantled, though this was also absent from written proposals.

Lavrov reiterated remarks in German newspaper Handelsblatt that he was open to talks on modernising the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty, where Russia has suspended its participation.—AFP