US President Donald Trump has said that “it would be great” if Moscow and Washington agreed on a new nuclear non-proliferation deal. The admission comes after rare phone talks between the Russian and US leaders last week.
Trump has not provided any details as to the current state of the negotiations, which have been underway for quite some time.
Last Thursday, Trump held a rare phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in which the two touched on a range of issues, among them the New Start Treaty, the last standing pillar upholding the nuclear arms control framework in the post-Cold War era.
The treaty, which came into force in 2011, was aimed at curbing the nuclear arsenals of the US and Russia by a third and limiting each side to having no more than 700 deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and strategic bombers. The number of deployed warheads was capped at 1,550, while the countries pledged to maintain no more than 800 deployed and non-deployed launchers.
The fate of the crucial arms control agreement has been hanging in the balance, with the Trump administration previously indicating that it wants the existing deal, which expires next year, to be replaced by a three-way agreement between US, Russia and China.
Hopes that the bilateral agreement could be salvaged despite the US stance resurfaced back in June, when the US and Russia agreed to hold arms control consultations in Vienna. However, the marathon talks that took place in the Austrian capital on June 22 largely fell through, and saw Washington bashing China while at the same time trying to persuade Moscow to bring Beijing on board.
Moscow said that while it believes that the revival of the talks after a year-and-a-half-long hiatus was a positive sign in itself, it would not pressure China into joining the negotiations, calling that expectation “unrealistic.”
The landmark treaty is the only remaining pillar of the global nuclear-proliferation system after the US dismantled two key arms control pacts, withdrawing from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in 2002 and quitting 1987 the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty last year.
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July 31, 2020 at 04:40PM
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A young man in Portland faces up to 20 years in prison on arson charges, accused of hurling a bomb at a courthouse amid ongoing police brutality protests. He was identified by a tactical vest gifted to him by his grandmother.
Gabriel Agard-Berryhill, 18, was charged with arson on Friday, the US Attorney’s Office in Oregon announced in a statement. The man is said to have thrown “a large explosive device” at a federal courthouse in Portland during a protest on Tuesday, which prosecutors argue could have “gravely injured law enforcement officers positioned near the courthouse, other protesters standing nearby, or himself.”
“The violent opportunists engaged in dangerous acts of violence, such as arson, need to realize there will be grave consequences,” said Russel Burger, a US Marshal.
Serious crimes of this nature go beyond mere property damage to the courthouse and endanger people’s lives.
Agard-Berryhill maintains he was not aware of the device’s explosive power, believing it was a small firework when it was given to him by another protester. But while he said the bomb’s “concussive” blast surprised him, footage of the incident captured by Ruptly appears to show him celebrating after the detonation.
You can clearly see the suspect who threw this device here. Green vest. He celebrates the success, collects some evidence and runs away. I bet there is plenty of other footage where he is visible.pic.twitter.com/kr2uOTtjMy
In a bizarre twist, according to prosecutors, Agard-Berryhill’s identity was discovered thanks to an internet review for a military-style tactical vest penned by the accused’s grandmother, who wrote: “I got this for my grandson who’s a protester downtown, he uses it every night and says it does the job,” leaving a five-star rating and a photo of a young man wearing the vest, alleged to be the bomb-thrower.
“Investigators later found the same photo on a Facebook page and, using law enforcement databases, were able to positively identify Agard-Berryhill,” Oregon prosecutors said, citing a joint probe by the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) and the US Marshals Service.
Agard-Berryhill made his first appearance in federal court on Friday, and has since been ordered released “pending further court proceedings.” He faces up to two decades behind bars for the arson charge, which carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years.
Protests have raged in Portland for some two months straight, kicked off amid a wave of similar demonstrations nationwide following the police killing of George Floyd, an unarmed black man. The protests have frequently descended into violence, seeing activists clash with law enforcement on a nightly basis for weeks on end as they besiege the city's federal courthouse. Federal agents were deployed to Portland earlier in July to protect historical monuments and other government property, which have become common targets for activists in recent months. Though the agents have struck a withdrawal deal with local authorities, US President Donald Trump has vowed to deploy National Guard troops to the city should the unrest continue, recently slamming the protests as a “beehive of terrorists.”
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July 31, 2020 at 03:56PM
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