In a statement issued Jan. 3 on the joint statement issued by the five nuclear powers of the UN Security Council the day before, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that the P5 document was formulated “on our initiative” and with the most “active participation of Russian representatives.” It had originally been scheduled to be released at the start of the Tenth Review Conference of parties to the Non-Proliferation Treaty agreement, but when this was postponed due to the pandemic, a decision was made to release it, given its importance. Moscow, Zakharova said, of course believes there can be no winners in a nuclear war, and therefore one should never be started.
“The statement highlights an important idea for us, that any war—whether nuclear or conventional—between nuclear-armed states is inadmissible,” and reaffirms earlier commitments by P5 nations that their nuclear weapons not be targeted at each other or at third parties. She indicated that “we expect that amid the current challenging international security environment, the endorsement of such a political statement by the leaders of nuclear powers will help to reduce international tensions, curb the arms race, help build confidence and shape the basis for future control over offensive and defensive arms in their interconnections, as well as risk reduction measures.”
https://tass.com/politics/1383689
In comments made to TASS yesterday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov explained that the P5 statement “was negotiated through diplomatic channels.” Asked how the countries had approved the statement, he replied that the text “comprehensively reflects the positions of the parties and the leaders.” He responded to a question about whether it were possible to indicate a time frame for a potential summit of the five powers—Russia, China, the U.K., France, and the U.S.—with the statement that “there are no dates yet.”
