Putin offers non-deployment of intermediate range missiles: Kremlin

MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin has sent to leaders of European and Asian countries and international organizations a proposal not to deploy missiles, previously banned by the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), the Kremlin said Thursday.

"President Putin continues efforts to prevent the growth of tension and destabilization of the situation in terms of global security and stability in the case of the deployment of short and medium-range missiles, which used to be prohibited," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

On Aug 2, Russia formally announced the termination of the INF treaty signed in 1987, after the United States withdrew from it.

After this, Putin said that Russia would not develop, produce or deploy missiles, previously banned by the treaty, unless the United Stated begins to do it.

On Wednesday, Russian Kommersant business daily reported that last week Putin sent a message to several dozen states proposing a moratorium on the deployment of intermediate and shorter-range missiles.

It quoted unnamed sources as saying that the letter had been sent to the leaders of all NATO countries and China, as well as European Union's High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

Peskov said that the proposal has not yet met with understanding on the part of NATO, which had alleged that Russia developed, produced and deployed a new intermediate-range missile known as the 9M729, or SSC-8.

Russia has denied the accusation and in turn accused the United States of deploying systems which could use missiles banned by the treaty and of conducting a test of an intermediate range cruise missile.