The superpowers may complete a treaty on 30 percent cuts in long-range nuclear weapons as early as November, a senior U.S. negotiator said Thursday.
Linton Brooks, deputy head of the U.S. delegation to the Geneva negotiations, told reporters he was confident the treaty would be finished by the end of the year, a target affirmed at last week's summit by President Bush and Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev."I think it's possible to do it as early as sometime in November," Brooks said.
The three major areas of disagreement are on limits to Soviet modernization of the SS-18 ballistic missile, constraints on the Soviet Backfire bomber and ways of limiting sales of long-range missiles to third countries.
Brooks said the negotiators, who return to the bargaining table in Geneva on Monday, also have a lot of work left on details of an inspection regime for the treaty.
Even as the superpowers are approaching the end of eight years of negotiations on this landmark treaty, some critics are saying the U.S.-Soviet approach to reducing offensive nuclear weapons is outdated.
On Wednesday, U.S. and Soviet scientists released a jointly published book that said future nuclear arms accords should provide for the destruction of warheads.