Soviet N-test ‘ready in week’

Press, 23 February 1987, Page 4

Soviet N-test ‘ready in week’

NZPA-Reuter Geneva Soviet scientists will need only one week to prepare a nuclear explosion once the Kremlin orders its first atomic test since 1985, said Western diplomatic sources at a 46-nation disarmament conference.

The sources, including some close to the United States delegation, viewed the timing of the next Soviet nuclear test as a purely political decision by the Kremlin. The Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, ordered a unilateral atomic test moratorium from August 6, 1985, and extended it five times. After an American nuclear test on February 3, Soviet officials said Moscow was no longer bound by the moratorium and would resume testing. No date was given. Andronik Petrosyants, head of the Soviet delegation in with the United states.

told reporters he hoped the Democrat-controlled United States Congress would stop the Reagan Administration’s testing programme. Asked when Moscow would carry out its next test, he told a news conference: “As for myself, I’m waiting for a decision made in the United States Congress, where the Democrats have a majority.”

He said this was a personal observation and noted that Soviet patience with the American refusal to join or discuss a nuclear test halt was “fading out”

The fourth round of United States-Soviet nuclear test talks has recessed until March 16 with no sign of progress. The two sides do not even agree on why they are meeting.

-Mr Petrosyants confirmed that the talks remained bogged down