China hopes that Russia and the United States will be able to extend the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying said on Friday
BEIJING (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 22nd January, 2021) China hopes that Russia and the United States will be able to extend the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying said on Friday.
Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that US President Joe Biden would offer Russia a five-year extension to the arms control treaty.
"The extension of New START will enhance the global strategic stability and world peace and security. We hope that the United States will work together with Russia to ensure the successful extension to the treaty and, based on that, reduce its nuclear arsenal," Hua said at a daily briefing.
New START has been in force since 2011 and is due to expire on February 5. It is the only remaining legally binding agreement on nuclear arms control between the two countries that own the world's two largest nuclear stockpiles. Its premises are that each signatory ultimately reduce their nuclear arsenal to total 700 intercontinental ballistic missiles, 1,550 nuclear warheads and 800 launchers.
The United States long sought replacing the treaty with a trilateral one that would include China, also a nuclear power, but Beijing made it clear it was not intending to join any such agreement.
