Moscow set to pull back troops, tanks

Press, 6 December 1979, Page 9

Moscow set to pull back troops, tanks

NZPA-Reuter East Berlin The Soviet Union will today begin withdrawing troops and tanks from East Germany in a symbolic ceremonial farewell to which dozens of Western journalists have been invited. The Soviet Presideni (Mr Leonid Brezhnev) an nounced last October that up to 20.1100 men and 1000 tanks would be withdrawn unconditionally from East Germany to prove that Moscow was sincerely committed to disarmament and detente. There appeared to be little doubt that the decision to begin the withdrawal today was aimed at influencing North Atlantic Treaty Organisation countries, whose Defence and Foreign Ministers will meet in Brussels next Wednesday to vote on plans to deploy more missiles in Western Europe.

Ihe Soy iet L nion has repeatedly urged N.A.T.O. to drop its proposals to deploy nearly 600 me-dium-range missiles capable ot striking at Soviet targets. Significantly, a meeting ot Foreign Ministers of ;he seven-nation Warsaw Pact alliance will begin meeting in East Berlin s (he first Soyiet withdrawals begin. Headed by the Soy iet Foreign Minister, Andrei Gromyko, the meeting expected to issue a last ippeal to the West to take up a Soviet offer of armsL ontrol talks bet ore taking i vote on the missiles. Many Western leaders, .deluding the West German Chancellor (Mr Helmut Schmidt), have already rejected that course, saying the missiles are badly needed to offset a growing Soy iet strategic superiority.

The Warsaw Pact Ministers are also expected » warn Western leaders that the communist alliance will take reciprocal measures to boost its own armaments it N.A.T.O. decides to install new weaponry. The gradual build-up of tension around the N.A.1.0. decision, fuelled by Sos iet warnings that it would destroy the basis for future Last-West talks, appeared to have been partly deflated by an announcement yesterday of an East-West German summit meeting in IPSO. Mr Schmidt told a congress of the ruling Social Democratic party in West Berlin that he would meet the East German Communist leader, Mr Erich Honecker, next year tor the first such summit meeting in nine years.