Russia suspends and halts from participating in the INF nuclear agreement treaty that was signed during the cold war era. The decision comes hours after Washington decided to withdraw from the treaty.
The Russian President Vladimir Putin said –
“Ours will be a mirror response. Our US partners say that they are halting their participation in the treaty, and we are doing the same. They say that they are doing research and testing [on new weapons] and we will do the same thing.“
Mr. Putin’s response comes after a meeting with Defence Minister Sergey Shoigu and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
On the 1st of Feb, US secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the withdrawal and an immediate suspension of the nuclear agreement. The US alleges that Russia deployed two 9M729 (SSC-8) missiles which are nuclear tipped in it’s defence strategy. Deploying of SSC-8 missile goes against the INF treaty.