Russia will lift its moratorium on deploying short- and medium-range missiles, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov confirmed in an interview with state media on Sunday.
The decision follows the United States’ move to deploy such weapons globally after withdrawing from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 2019.
“We are assessing the situation on the basis of an analysis of the destabilising actions of the United States and NATO in the strategic sphere and, accordingly, the evolution of the threats that arise from them,” Lavrov said.
“Today it is clear that, for example, our moratorium on the deployment of short- and medium-range missiles is no longer practically viable and will have to be abandoned. The U.S. has arrogantly ignored the warnings of Russia and China and in practice has moved on to the deployment of weapons of this class in various regions of the world,” he added.
Since the U.S. withdrew from the INF Treaty in 2019, Russia had maintained that it would refrain from deploying such missiles as long as the U.S. did the same. However, with Washington’s actions, this stance is set to change.
