The United States has announced that it intends to withdraw from the Open Skies Agreement, which includes 35 countries that allow air reconnaissance operations with unarmed aircraft in the airspace of the participating countries, saying that Russia has repeatedly violated the terms of the agreement.
Senior officials of the US administration said that the withdrawal will be officially within six months under the terms of exit of the Convention.
This is the most recent step by the Trump administration to take the United States out of a major international treaty, after it withdrew from the mid-range nuclear powers treaty with Russia last year.
On the other hand, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced that the United States has not yet formally notified it of its withdrawal from the open sky agreement, expressing its disappointment with this decision.
The director of the department of non-proliferation and arms control in the Russian Foreign Ministry Vladimir Armickov in an interview with the agency «Novosti» yesterday: «We did not have any information in this regard so far».
He continued, "If that happens, it will definitely be an unfortunate step that comes in the context of the current (US) administration's approach to undermining all agreements in the field of arms control."
Yermakov stressed that the "open sky" is an agreement of the utmost importance in terms of ensuring speculation of the steps of the other side and mutual trust in Europe and on a larger scale.
The open sky agreement includes 32 countries, and allows unarmed surveillance aircraft to fly in the airspace of member states, with the aim of enhancing mutual understanding and trust by giving all parties a direct role in collecting information about the military and activities that concern them.
The open sky agreement will become the third international agreement in the field of arms control, from which the Trump administration, which previously left in 2018 the nuclear deal with Iran, will withdraw from it, and last year it exited the Intermediate and Short Range Missile Treaty concluded with Moscow in 1987.
This comes amid fears that Washington will decide not to extend the START treaty, which provides for reducing the limits of strategic offensive warheads to the United States and Russia, and expires next year.