Obama, Medvedev set to sign new arms reduction treaty

Presidents Dmitry Medvedev of Russia and Barack Obama of the United States are on a visit to Prague to sign a treaty they both had hailed as a major step forward on arms control and U.S.-Russian relations.

In his speech in the Czech capital last April, Obama declared “America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons” and vowed to hammer out a new pact with Russia to replace the now expired 1991 strategic arms reduction treaty, the so-called ‘Start.’

Parties agreed to start talks on new arms reduction treaty in London on April 1 2009. In this relation a commission, involving more than 30 representatives of various structures, started consultations in Geneva to design a new document. Consultations consisted of 10 rounds of talks.

The White House said the treaty will lower the number of long-range deployed nuclear warheads by 30%; however, some experts and analysts are saying that the actual reduction will be much smaller.