• Russia’s radar station in the Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad will monitor missile launches from the North Atlantic, as well as the future European missile defence system. Thus Russia will be able to control the entire European continent and the Atlantic, including the European missile defence system. Russia’s air defence system will have the capability to intercept any type of missiles, any targets at any speed, including hypersonic ones.
• The new system, comprising air defence, missile defence, missile early warning attack and space control systems, started running by December 1. The news came after President Dmitry Medvedev earlier held that Russia would move advanced offensive weapon systems to its European borders in response to a planned US-backed NATO missile shield if talks on the project don’t work out. Washington responded by saying it would not alter its plans for a European missile defence project, despite increasingly tough rhetoric from Moscow.

Background

• Moscow is seeking written, legally binding guarantees that the NATO missile shield will not be directed against it. Washington, however, has refused to put its verbal assurances in writing.