First real chance of arms accord — experts

Press, 6 March 1987, Page 6

First real chance of arms accord — experts

By

Claude Fillet, Reuters

(through NZPA)

Geneva

The United States and the Soviet Union have made radical new proposals for big cuts in their medium-range missile arsenals in what disarmament experts regard as the first real chance of a super-Power arms accord.

United States negotiators presented their Soviet counterparts with a draft treaty on Wednesday proposing the removal of all the super-Powers’ medium-range nuclear missiles from Europe, and to cut them elsewhere to 100 warheads on each side.

The United States proposal appeared strikingly similar to a Soviet offer for an accord on inter-mediate-range nuclear forces made by the Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, last week-end. Moscow’s offer, offi-

cially presented by Soviet negotiators in Geneva on Monday, corresponds to Washington’s policy of separating the deal from long-range missiles and space weapons.

Previously, the Soviet Union insisted that an accord on intermediate missiles in Europe must be linked to big cuts in longrange missiles and curbs on the United States plan for a space-based missile defence system, known as the Strategic Defence Initiative or “star wars.”

An American negotiator, Maynard Glitman, said: “We think we’ve got a very good treaty ... It’s a complete document. It has to be because we want precision. We don’t want ambiguities. We’re putting a full treaty text on the table, including almost all verification issues.” The draft called for the removal and destruction of all United States Pershing 2 and Cruise missiles

and Soviet SS2O missiles in Europe over five years and the reduction outside Europe to 100 mediumrange atomic warheads on each side, Mr Glitman said.

Under the treaty these warheads would be confined to United States territory and Soviet Asia.

“But our preference would be to see the remaining 100 (warheads) removed on both sides, if the Soviets would agree to that,” he said. The United States draft was based on a formula worked out between Mr Gorbachev and President Ronald Reagan at their October summit meeting in Reykjavik, he said. Asked if he agreed with a view expressed by Soviet officials that a treaty might be reached ' within six months, Mr Glitman said: “We are not going to shoot for a deadline and not do a good