GORBACHEV TELLS EU, RUSSIA: DON’T BE AFRAID OF NEGOTIATIONS

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has expressed hope for an improvement in relations between Russia and the European Union, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.

Ties between the powers took a downturn with the 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, followed by alleged assassination plots in Europe, claims of election-meddling and, most recently, the poisoning and jailing of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, Ulf Mauder also reported on February 28, 2021, for Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).

Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union who later won the Nobel Peace Prize, said that even though relations are at their lowest point since the Cold War, common ground could be found. "One should not be afraid of negotiations," Gorbachev told Interfax.

"Only negotiations, only meetings at all levels - especially at the highest - can bring positive results. I believe in this."

Gorbachev, who turns 90 on Tuesday, also called on Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart Joe Biden to hold a face-to-face meeting and new nuclear disarmament negotiations.

"The main thing today is to prevent nuclear war," Gorbachev urged. "To achieve progress, it is necessary to approach each other openly." Washington and Moscow agreed in late January, after Biden took office, to extend the last major nuclear disarmament treaty, known as New START, for five years.

The Strategic Nuclear Arms Limitation Treaty had entered into force on February 5, 2011.

The agreement, which would have expired in early February, limits the nuclear arsenals of Russia and the United States to 800 delivery systems and 1,550 deployable nuclear warheads each.

Russia and the US together possess about 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons.

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