Medvedev blames NATO for abandoning moratorium on short- and medium-range nuclear missiles

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has accused NATO countries of abandoning a moratorium on short- and medium-range nuclear missiles and said Moscow would take further steps in response, Reuters reported, quoted by BTA.

Medvedev, who has been involved in a sharp exchange of words on social media with US President Donald Trump, made his comments after the Russian Foreign Ministry said Moscow no longer considered itself bound by the moratorium on the deployment of short- and medium-range nuclear missiles.

"The Russian Foreign Ministry's statement on the withdrawal from the moratorium on the deployment of short- and medium-range missiles is the result of the anti-Russian policy of NATO countries," Medvedev wrote in English in "Ex".

"This is a new reality that all our opponents will have to come to terms with. Expect further steps."

Medvedev, now deputy head of Russia's powerful Security Council, did not provide further details.

In 2019, the United States withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, citing Russia's non-compliance. Russia has since said it will not deploy such weapons unless Washington does so.

However, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov signaled last December that Moscow would have to respond to what he called "destabilizing actions" by the US and NATO in the strategic sphere.

"As the situation develops towards the actual deployment of US-made land-based medium- and short-range missiles in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region, the Russian Foreign Ministry notes that the conditions for maintaining the unilateral moratorium on the deployment of such weapons have disappeared", the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, signed in 1987 by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and US President Ronald Reagan, eliminated an entire class of weapons - land-based missiles with ranges from 500 to 5,500 km.