Russia Scraps Missile Deployment After Obama Cancels Missile Shield

Launcher of Iskander missile rides in column of Russian military vehicles, during rehearsal for Victory Day military parade in Moscow, 29 Apr 2008 file photoRussia says it has scrapped plans to deploy missiles in a region nearPoland after U.S. President Barack Obama canceled plans for a missiledefense system in Central Europe.

In a radio interview Saturday,Russian Deputy Defense Minister Vladimir Popovkin said Mr. Obama's movehas made the deployment of Iskander short-range missiles in theKaliningrad region unnecessary.

President Obama said Thursday heis replacing the planned missile defense system with what he called anew approach for defending the United States and its NATO allies from amissile threat from Iran.

Russia had fiercely opposed the earlier planned system as a threat to its security.  

Some U.S. Republican leaders and East European politicians have criticized the change as misguided.

Friday,U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States is notshelving missile defenses but implementing a more comprehensive defensesystem. She insisted the United States is not walking away from itsallies.

Thursday, U.S. Republican Senator John McCain called thedecision a step backwards at a time when Eastern European countries areincreasingly wary of what he called "renewed Russian adventurism."

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have both praised Mr. Obama's decision.

SomeCzech and Polish officials said the development will not endanger thesecurity of their countries.  But others, such as former Czech PrimeMinister Mirek Topolanek, whose government negotiated the missiledeployment accord, said the decision threatens Czech security.

Poland'sForeign Minister Radek Sikorsky called the timing of the announcementclumsy, noting that it came on the 70th anniversary of the Sovietinvasion of his country during World War Two.

In hisannouncement, Mr. Obama said the change follows a new assessment ofIran's missile program.  The missile defense system planned for centralEurope was supposed to counter an attack from Iranian intercontinentalballistic missiles.

Former U.S. President George W. Bush first proposed building a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic in 2006.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.