Russia has been anxious about the United States' plans to deploy elements of its missile shield in Central Europe, treating them as a security threat. Washington has said the systems are needed to counter possible attacks from Iran, now in the center of an international nuclear dispute.
Sean McCormack said Washington would like the Russians to take part in research and development as part of its ABM program, but believed it unlikely they would accept the proposal, which nevertheless remained valid.
Sean McCormack said the proposal had been made at consultations with Russia, which he said was facing similar problems, and it would be put forward again at further consultations, when Washington would set out its case for the deployment of a radar and a missile base in the former Communist Czech Republic and Poland.
A senior Pentagon official said March 1 the U.S. also would like to place missile defense elements in the South Caucasus, but did not specify which of the three former Soviet countries it would choose - Armenia, Azerbaijan or Georgia - with the latter being anxious to join NATO.
Moscow said it would have to develop an adequate response to the possible missile shield deployment in the Caucasus. But a U.S. diplomat later said Washington was not conducting talks on the possible placement of a U.S. missile shield in the region.
McCormack said it was so far unclear whether the problem would be raised at a NATO ministerial meeting in Oslo in late April, which was to be attended by Russia, but Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was prepared for discussions.
The Russia-NATO Council is expected to consider the U.S. missile defense plans April 19, diplomatic sources in Brussels said in March.
A U.S. Missile Defense Agency official said Thursday an interceptor missile radar would be relocated from Marshall Islands in the Pacific to the Czech Republic by spring 2011.
Rick Lehner said the agency planned to complete the construction of facilities in the former Communist-bloc country by November 2010 and then relocate the radar, deployed in the Pacific island for nine years.
