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The lower house of Russia’s parliament on Wednesday quickly endorsed President Vladimir Putin’s move to suspend the last remaining nuclear arms treaty with the United States, with officials and lawmakers casting it as an eleventh-hour warning to Washington amid the tensions over Ukraine.
Putin declared that Moscow was suspending its participation in the 2010 New START treaty in his state-of-the-nation address Tuesday, saying that Russia can’t accept U.S. inspections of its nuclear sites under the pact while Washington and its NATO allies have openly declared the goal of Russia’s defeat in Ukraine.
The Russian president emphasized that Moscow was not withdrawing from the pact altogether, and the Russian Foreign Ministry said the country would respect the caps on nuclear weapons set under the treaty and keep notifying the U.
