MOSCOW, April 22. /TASS/. Moscow calls for creating a dialogue mechanism to discuss missile issues on the United Nations platform, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Ambassador-at-Large Grigory Mashkov said in an op-ed for the International Affairs magazine.

"Whatever the situation in the missile field, there is a need to make preparations to launch a dialogue mechanism on the United Nations platform to discuss the entire range of missile issues. Such a proposal could be sent to the UN secretary general, and we also could highlight our readiness to take a leading role in the process," the diplomat pointed out.

According to him, the discussion may get a boost from a draft resolution on missiles in all their aspects, which could be submitted to the UN General Assembly First Committee.

Mashkov emphasized that the notion that there could be no winners in a missile arms race should be the key message of the discussion. The missile build-up will ruin economies and impoverish populations. "An equal dialogue between nations with significant missile capabilities, would have to find not-so-simple responses to the existing missile challenges, may be the only alternative to a missile race," the Russian diplomat concluded.