US denies 'gamesmanship' over Putin radar offer

Washington, June 13: The White House insisted today it was not playing ''gamesmanship'' as it weighed Russian President Vladimir Putin's alternative offer to a planned US missile shield in Europe.

US President George W. Bush has signaled no intention of scrapping the plan in the face of Putin's surprise proposal last week for joint use of a radar station that Russia controls in Azerbaijan as a means of countering missile threats.

Washington so far has withheld judgment on Putin's offer, saying it needs time to study it and consult with allies.

Relations between Washington and Moscow have chilled as the United States has negotiated to place 10 missile interceptors in Poland and a radar station in the Czech Republic as part of a global system to protect against missile threats from Iran and other countries it sees as ''rogue'' states.

Putin, keen to avoid a U.S. missile defense system near Russia's borders where Moscow says it could threaten its security, sprung his proposal on Bush at a summit of the Group of Eight (G8) industrialized nations in Germany.

''What we now have is a basis of conversation,'' White House spokesman Tony Snow told reporters when asked whether the United States was looking for a way to make Putin's offer work or trying to come up with a face-saving way to reject it.

''The implication before the G8 was that Russia was adamantly opposed to any kind of (missile) defense. It turns out that it's not. We look at that as a constructive step forward.'' ''And frankly we don't look at this as gamesmanship,'' Snow added, saying Bush and Putin would discuss the matter at the Bush family estate in Kennebunkport, Maine, on July 1-2.

Despite US insistence it did not consider Moscow an enemy, Putin had threatened to revert to the Cold War practice of targeting missiles at Europe if the plan goes ahead, Russian officials now say joint use of the Azeri radar station will make the US missile shield unnecessary.

US officials have stressed they see eastern Europe as the best location from which to preempt missile threats from the Middle East.

Reuters>