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US, Russia defence heads talk Afghan campaign, arms
By Oleg Shchedrov
MOSCOW, Nov 3 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld left Moscow for former Soviet Central Asia on Saturday after talks in the Kremlin on support by Russia's intelligence services for the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan.
"Today we discussed the specific levels of our cooperation," Russian Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov told reporters after attending a meeting between Rumsfeld and President Vladimir Putin.
"To a large part it concerns Russia's use of special services and here I cannot comment any further," said Ivanov, who earlier held separate talks with his U.S. counterpart.
Russia, while backing Washington's anti-terrorism campaign, has ruled out any involvement of its armed forces in the U.S.-led operation. It was clear that by "special services" Ivanov was referring to intelligence agents and not special operations commandos.
Rumsfeld's eight-hour visit to Moscow was the first leg of a whirlwind four-day tour of five countries for talks on the war on terrorism, the Pentagon said.
He was headed for Tajikistan from Moscow and was also to visit Uzbekistan and Pakistan, which also border Afghanistan, and India.
Russia has sided with the United States in efforts to form a global anti-terrorism coalition. It has also backed the U.S. military campaign aimed at wiping out the ruling Taliban, which harbours Saudi-born dissident Osama bin Laden -- blamed by Washington for the September 11 attacks on the United States.
Supplying intelligence information to the United States about terrorist organisations and Afghanistan was part of Russia's contribution to the war.
PUTIN IMPRESSED
With a U.S. summit meeting scheduled in 10 days with President George W. Bush, Putin was eager to underscore the increasing warmth in the relationship.
He told Rumsfeld he was impressed by the level of cooperation between the two powers' military and special services, referred to in Russia as "power structures."
"After the meeting with the U.S. President in Shanghai we witnessed a further rapprochement between the power structures including special services," he said referring to his encounter with Bush on the fringes of the regional summit in China.
But Ivanov, mindful of the Russian public and the trauma of Moscow's 10-year armed intervention in Afghanistan which cost thousands of Russian lives, once again emphasised that Russian troops would not be sent to Afghanistan.
"I see no reason why we should change our position," he said.
Russia has also encouraged its Central Asian allies to back the U.S. military effort. Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and another Afghan neighbour Turkmenistan have pledged airspace and bases for U.S. search-and-rescue and humanitarian operations.
RIA news agency said Rumsfeld could visit Khanabad air base in Uzbekistan, where more than 1,000 U.S. troops are based.
Cooperation in the war against terror has created a better climate for sorting out issues which soured ties between Moscow and Washington in the early months of Bush's administration.
MISSILE PLAN A PROBLEM
The main sticking point has been U.S. missile defence plans, which run counter to the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile pact because it limits such systems. Washington wants the ABM pact to be scrapped as a relic of the Cold War.
After the September attacks Bush appeared even more committed to plans to set up an umbrella shield against missile attacks from so-called "rogue states."
Talks about the ABM treaty will figure in the summit in Washington and at Bush's Texas ranch from November 13-15.
The Washington Post said on Thursday Bush and Putin were likely to announce a deal to allow testing of a missile defence system and cut strategic nuclear warheads without dumping the ABM treaty.
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, fresh from talks with U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, said on Friday it was premature to speak of such accords.
However, defence minister Ivanov indicated that Russia was ready for some kind of compromise.
"The ABM is an important but not the only component of strategic stability," he said. "We have been often told in the past that the ABM treaty is a relic of the Cold War. In part, and I repeat in part, I agree with this."
"But all Russian-U.S. agreements are, to a certain extent, relics of the Cold War," Ivanov added.
"Russia and the United States understand that we should look into the future together. But before dropping any one agreement...we believe it is better to do so when something new is already in place."
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