Today.Az » Politics » Azerbaijan, Georgia say not in missile-defense talks
04 March 2007 [12:32] - Today.Az
Officials in Azerbaijan and Georgia say they are not currently in talks with the United States over placing parts of a missile-defense system on their territory.
"There has been no request to Azerbaijan and no negotiations are being conducted to that effect," Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry deputy spokesman Khazar Ibrahim told RFE/RL in Baku. AP quoted Georgian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Nato Chikovani as saying that Georgia has not received a request from Washington to deploy missile-defense components on its territory. U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General Henry Obering, director of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, said on March 1 that the United States wants to base an antimissile radar in the Caucasus. Meanwhile, German Defense Minister Franz-Josef Jung has urged more talks within NATO on the U.S. missile-defense plans. The United States has already formally requested to place a radar base in the Czech Republic and missile interceptors in Poland.
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