MOSCOW, May 18. /TASS/. Moscow approaches the completion of internal procedures on the denunciation of the Treaty on Open Skies, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told journalists on Tuesday.
In response to a question as to why denouncing the treaty became an irreversible process, the senior diplomat noted that, unfortunately, it is the stance of the US and its allies that is irreversible since they don’t want to "listen to the voice of reason." "We called on them dozens of times not to be too hasty, to weigh the opportunities we were retaining, to return to the treaty. This didn’t happen. In full accordance with the president’s formulation, the Russian Federation is moving towards completing its internal procedures," he said. "Right now, the most important meeting of the State Duma committee on international affairs has just been finished where the committee unanimously approved the president’s proposal to denounce this treaty," the diplomat specified.
Commenting on the technical aspects of the denunciation, the deputy minister noted that after completing the internal procedures which include the approval of a law by the State Duma, the Federation Council and the signing of the document by the president, the country will present a diplomatic note, informing its depositories, Canada and Hungary, of a decision to exit the treaty.
"From that moment on, from the day of the note, a six-month term provided for in the treaty itself will begin during which the remaining participants make decisions based on the fact that a country is leaving the treaty. So we will officially stop being a party to it six months after the note is presented," the senior diplomat explained.
Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin submitted a bill to the State Duma on denouncing the Treaty on Open Skies. In practice, the treaty grants a right to member states to perform surveillance flights of their territories in order to observe military activity in accordance with the coordinated and stipulated quotas of observation missions. The treaty regulates the order of flights, defines the control mechanism of the document’s provisions and contains requirements for planes and surveillance equipment.
On January 15, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced that Russia was launching domestic procedures to withdraw from the Treaty on Open Skies, justifying this step by a lack of progress in removing obstacles in order for the treaty to remain effective after Washington pulled out of it in November 2020. In April, the US Department of State announced that US authorities have not yet made a decision to return to the treaty. Washington has blamed Moscow for years for selectively implementing the Treaty on Open Skies and violating a number of its provisions. Russia, in turn, has expressed grievances related to Washington’s implementation of the treaty.