Obama Offers to Drop Missile Project If Russian Helps Deal With Iran

Russia today signalled that it is ready to accept a secret offer made by Barack Obama to drop US plans for a European missile defence system in return for Moscow's help in dealing with Iran.

Obama's move is a bold one, aimed at breaking the years-long stalemate in attempts to prevent Iran securing a nuclear weapons capability.

Obama made the extraordinary offer last month in a letter to the Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev, hand-delivered to the Russian government by US officials in Moscow.

Russia has long opposed the establishment of the US missile defence system in Eastern Europe, seeing it as a threat. It was the main source of deteriorating relations between Moscow and Washington during the Bush years.

Russia has been slow to co-operate with the US and Europe over Iran, reluctant to impose tougher sanctions and continuing to help Tehran build up its civil nuclear programme. If Russia was to join the US and Europe in imposing severe sanctions on Tehran, this might help put pressure on the Iranian administration.

The offer was disclosed by a Russian news agency on Monday and confirmed by US officials on Monday night.

The US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, is scheduled to meet the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, in Geneva on Friday, while Medvedev is planning to issue an invite at a London summit next month for Obama to visit Russia.

The US is still reviewing its policy towards Iran, but what is evolving is a combination of an offer to Tehran to negotiate directly with Washington combined with a threat of greater economic sanctions. The latter is where the Russians would fit in.

Clinton, in talks in the Gulf on Monday, expressed doubts about whether Obama's offer of direct talks would work, indicating she thought harsher sanctions was the more likely route.