Igor Vishnevetskii, deputy director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s non-proliferation and arms control department, warned the Tenth Review Conference on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) that a hybrid war against Russia is fraught with the danger of a nuclear conflict, which cannot be won by anyone. “The flagrant violation of the principle of equal and indivisible security as a result of the malign expansion of the military bloc of countries, which are claiming absolute military-strategic and geopolitical dominance, has provoked an acute crisis in the center of Europe,” he said, reported TASS. “Russia is committed to a noble goal of building a world free from nuclear weapons,” he stressed, and that it implements all of its international liabilities under the NPT treaty. (https://tass.com/politics/1488403)
However, the progress that was reached with Russia’s help “has been devalued by the United States’ course toward ignoring Russia’s red lines in the sphere of defense,” Vishnevetskii said. “In such a situation, responsible behavior of nuclear powers is important as never before. Russia insists that a nuclear war cannot be won and it must never be unleashed.” (https://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/news/1824889/)
China, meanwhile, has reiterated its no-first-use policy on nuclear weapons. “China is committed to the path of peaceful development and self-defense strategy and vows to never be the first to use nuclear weapons under any circumstances,” Chinese Foreign Ministry Arms Control Department Director Fu Cong said in an address to the NPT conference. Fu Cong pointed out that China’s stockpile of nuclear weapons is “at the minimum level necessary to ensure national security.”
“We do not compete with any country in power, quantity and scale of our nuclear potential, and we do not engage in arms race of any kind,” he underscored.
As for President Joe Biden’s statement proposing negotiations towards a new arms control treaty to replace New START when it expires in 2026, it is being dismissed by Moscow. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, during a joint news conference with Myanmar’s Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin, said this morning that the U.S. has not approached Russia about resuming talks on a document to replace New START. “They [the U.S.] have not even suggested resuming these talks. There have been no appeals to us about resuming the negotiation process,” Lavrov said, reported TASS. According to Lavrov, the Americans have made a habit of “announcing some things over the microphone and then forgetting about them.” (https://tass.com/politics/1488499)
