Vladimir Putin held out an olive branch to the new US Administration yesterday, promising to turn his back on the confrontations of the past and saying that militarisation would not solve the world’s problems.

The Russian Prime Minister’s comments came hours after the Kremlin halted a deployment of missiles in Europe that threatened a new freeze in relations between the two nuclear powers. Defence Ministry officials said that the decision had been taken in response to signals from Mr Obama that he was reconsidering US plans for a missile defence shield in Poland and the Czech Republic.

The Bush Administration had ignored Moscow’s objections by signing agreements last year to install ten interceptor missiles and a radar station in Eastern Europe, which the Kremlin regards as being in its sphere of influence. Russia has maintained that stationing a missile shield there would not protect against rogue regimes in the Middle East but would be a direct challenge to itself.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Mr Putin called on President Obama to “co-operate constructively” in international affairs. “We wish the new team success,” he said. Mr Putin, who, as President, oversaw a big increase in Russia’s defence budgets and a more assertive foreign policy, appeared last night to be far more conciliatory. “Militarisation does not help solve problems. We are against spending more money on military efforts,” he said.

Expert View

The Russians seem to have finally grasped the implications of Mr Obama’s whirlwind foreign policy review

Richard Beeston, Foreign Editor

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The day after Mr Obama’s election victory in November the Kremlin said it would position Iskander short-range missiles, which can carry nuclear warheads, in Russia’s Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad. President Medvedev spoke to Mr Obama for the first time by telephone on Monday. The White House declined yesterday to give details of their conversation, but issued a statement saying: “The presidents agreed that, as they were both new leaders from a post-Cold War generation, they have a unique opportunity to establish a fundamentally different kind of relationship between our two countries.”

The White House said that Mr Obama told Mr Medvedev that Russia and the US had “a significant role to play in leading the rest of the world in reducing nuclear arsenals and preventing the spread of nuclear weapons, technologies, and materials”.

The US President is understood to be keen to enlist the Kremlin’s help in dissuading Iran from developing a nuclear bomb. Russia is helping the Islamic republic to build a $1 billion nuclear power plant at Bushehr and has delivered 82 tonnes of lowenriched uranium fuel for it.

Robert Wood, a spokesman for the US State Department, confirmed yesterday that US plans to deploy the system in Eastern Europe were “under review” but would not say when a decision could be expected.

Mr Obama has been accused of vacillating on the issue, with seemingly contradictory statements being given out in the course of his election campaign. White House aides said yesterday that the President’s support depended not only on the technology being proven to work but also on whether it could be done in a “fiscally responsible fashion”.

Democrats have repeatedly scorned the Pentagon budget of $10 billion a year for a defence shield that they doubt will work, even though Lieutenant-General Trey Obering — the outgoing head of the programme — declared recently that critics were “behind the curve” with developments in the technology.

An official from Russia’s General Staff told reporters yesterday: “The new US Administration is not pushing ahead with the plans to deploy the US missile defence system in Poland and the Czech Republic. Russia does not need to deploy Iskanders in Kaliningrad if the US does not install missile defence facilities in Eastern Europe.”

Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s Foreign Minister, told parliament that relations with the US would “start anew”.

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