Trump urges new nuclear treaty after Russia agreement ends

Summary

• The New START treaty between the US and Russia has expired, prompting Donald Trump to call for a new nuclear treaty including China.
• China has rejected inclusion in a new treaty, while campaigners warn of a potential global arms race and reduced nuclear stability.
• UN Secretary-General António Guterres warns of a “grave moment” and heightened risk of nuclear weapon use, urging negotiations.

WASHINGTON - US President Donald Trump on Feb 5 called for a brand new nuclear treaty after the last agreement with Russia expired, prompting fears of a new global arms race.

The Trump administration has repeatedly pressed for a new treaty to include China, whose arsenal is growing but still significantly smaller than those of Russia and the US.

But Beijing has publicly rejected the pressure.

Mr Trump had been mostly mum on Russian calls to extend New START - the 2010 treaty that imposed the last restrictions on the two largest nuclear powers after decades of agreements dating from the Cold War.

But hours after it expired, Mr Trump said that the treaty, signed by predecessor Barack Obama and extended by Mr Joe Biden, was “badly negotiated” and “is being grossly violated”.

“We should have our Nuclear Experts work on a new, improved, and modernized Treaty that can last long into the future,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Asked if Washington and Moscow had agreed to stick to the terms of the expired START treaty while negotiations on a new accord are ongoing, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said: “Not to my knowledge.”

Russia had refused inspections under New START as relations deteriorated with the Biden administration.

It said on Feb 4 that it no longer considered itself bound on the number of nuclear warheads
due to the expiration of New START.

Despite the stalemate on New START, Mr Trump has enthusiastically restarted diplomacy with Russia and invited President Vladimir Putin to Alaska in August 2025.

The US announced on Feb 5 that it was resuming military dialogue
with Russia after three-way talks in Abu Dhabi on the Ukraine war.

‘Unconstrained nuclear competition’

Campaigners have warned that the end of the New START treaty could trigger a global arms race,
and urged nuclear powers to enter negotiations.

A group of former senior arms control officials from around the world, in a joint statement on Feb 5, called on the United States and Russia to agree to keep observing New START’s limits as a first step.

The end of New START “will reduce nuclear stability and predictability, threaten global security, and increase the risk of a new era of unconstrained nuclear competition,” they wrote.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the nuclear treaties between the US and Russia after more than half a century were at a “grave moment.”

“This dissolution of decades of achievement could not come at a worse time – the risk of a nuclear weapon being used is the highest in decades,” Mr Guterres said, after Russian suggestions of using tactical nuclear weapons early in the Ukraine war.

A NATO official, speaking on condition of anonymity, called for “restraint and responsibility” and said that the US-led military alliance “will continue to take steps necessary” to ensure its defence.

The official condemned “Russia’s irresponsible nuclear rhetoric.”

China rejects pressure

On Feb 4, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that arms control was “impossible” without including China.

China’s foreign ministry expressed regret on Feb 5 over New START’s demise
but said Beijing “will not participate in nuclear disarmament negotiations at this stage.”

“China’s nuclear capabilities are of a totally different scale as those of the United States and Russia,” foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian told a news conference.

Russia and the United States together control more than 80 per cent of the world’s nuclear warheads.

China’s nuclear arsenal is growing faster than any country’s, by about 100 new warheads a year since 2023, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

China is estimated to have at least 600 nuclear warheads, the institute says – well below the 800 each at which Russia and the US were capped under New START.

France and Britain, treaty-bound US allies, together have another 100.

Mr Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, which warns of nuclear risks, agreed that China should engage.

But “there is no indication that Trump or his team have taken the time to propose risk reduction or arms control talks with China since returning to office in 2025,” Mr Kimball said. AFP