Azerbaijan, Georgia Say Not In Missile-Defense Talks
March 02, 2007
March 2, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- 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, RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service reported.
"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 today.
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.
(with material from AP)