Reports: Kremlin rejects US missile defense

Reports: Kremlin rejects US missile defense (NSI News Source Info) AP - November 13, 2008: The Kremlin has rejected a second of U.S. proposals offered to assuage increasingly strident Russian criticism of plans for an American missile-defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic, news agencies reported Wednesday.The U.S. administration says the system based would protect Europe from attacks by Iranian long-range missiles. Moscow has angrily dismissed those assertions, saying the system could eliminate Russia's nuclear deterrent or spy on its military installations.In a major speech just hours after Barack Obama won the U.S. presidential vote, President Dmitry Medvedev pledged to base short-range Iskander missiles in the Baltic Sea region of Kaliningrad, bordering Poland, if the U.S. goes forward with its plans.U.S. President George W. Bush's administration later sent Moscow a new set of proposals. Previous U.S. proposals involved, among other things, offers to allow Russia to send observers to monitor the missile defense sites. Russian and U.S. officials have not publicly disclosed the contents of the latest proposals.However, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, speaking this weekend after meetings with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, called them insufficient.On Wednesday, an unnamed Kremlin official told Russian news agencies that Moscow was prepared to work with Washington on questions of European security. But the official accused the Bush administration of trying to limit the incoming Obama administration's choices on the issue. «The Americans have presented us with several proposals. These proposals are inadequate, they have nothing new in them,» the official said.The Kremlin refused to comment on the report.The comments come as the U.S. State Department's third-ranked official, William Burns, traveled to Moscow for talks with senior Russian officials on Iran and other matters.The U.S. Embassy issued a statement saying Burns met with Lavrov and Kremlin foreign policy aide Sergei Prikhodko for discussions on various subjects, including talks on missile defense that would take place next month. No further details were released. In Brussels, the Russian ambassador to the European Union said Medvedev's speech was intended as a signal to the Obama administration «Russia has been warning the international community for many months that we would have to react,» Ambassador Vladimir Chizhov told reporters. «Russia wants to be transparent.«But no final decisions have been taken,» Chizhov said at a news conference ahead of an EU-Russia summit Friday in Nice, France. «I don't want to prejudge any decision that President-elect Obama will be taking, but I believe it's best for him to know what to expect from Russia in case this decision is taken,» he said. Associated Press Writer Slobodan Lekic contributed to this report from Brussels