Lisbon, Nov. 20: Nato leaders agreed on Friday to establish a missile defense shield that would cover all Nato member states, and on Saturday they expect Russia to agree to discuss the possibility of cooperating on the system’s development.
The US President, Mr Barack Obama, who has promoted a less costly, more flexible missile defense system that will have components in Europe and at sea, praised the day’s work, saying that for the first time “we’ve agreed to develop a missile defense capability that is strong enough to cover all Nato European territory and populations as well as the United States.”
Turkey, which had seemed to present a potential sticking point, dropped its objections to a common missile defense system when it was satisfied that no country, particularly Iran, would be named as a principal threat.
Missile defense has long created tensions between Nato and Russia, but American officials were optimistic that the meeting would prove more productive than earlier ones with the Russian president at the time, Mr Vladimir V. Putin, who made no secret of his mistrust of the alliance.