UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday called upon world leaders to come to Moscow for a conference to ban the militarization of space -- a challenge to any American plan to build an antimissile defense system.
Addressing the Millennium Summit at the United Nations, Putin described the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty as a "foundation" of the entire nuclear arms control system.
"Particularly alarming are the plans for the militarization of space," Putin said.
Noting that the next year will see the 40th anniversary of Russia sending the first man into space, Putin said that Moscow would be the "most proper place for such a conference."
He did not mention the United States in his address. But his statement came as the latest signal that Russia would continue pushing the United States to fully abandon its plans to deploy defenses against missile threats from rogue nations, such as North Korea.
Putin has welcomed President Clinton's announcement that he would leave the final decision on whether to deploy the missile system to the next administration.
In his speech Wednesday, Putin also proposed to bar the use of enriched uranium and pure plutonium in the world atomic energy production. "Incineration of plutonium and other radioactive elements creates prerequisites for the final solution of the radioactive residues problem," Putin said.
Putin is on his first trip to the United States as Russian president. Plunging into international diplomacy, Putin planned a series of bilateral meetings that would involve Chinese leader Jiang Zemin, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, Indonesia's Abdurrahman Wahid and many others during the three-day conference.
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