MOSCOW. May 20 (Interfax) - The United States is using bogus stories regarding Russia's plans to deploy weapons in space to cover up its own initiatives in this area, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said.
"Bogus stories regarding Russian nuclear weapons in space have become one of the underpinnings of destructive [and] deeply destabilizing activities that the United States has been pursuing for years," Ryabkov told reporters on Monday.
He was commenting on the New York Times' report that the U.S. wants to deploy a new generation of ground- and space-based instruments to defend its satellite constellation and attack enemy satellites.
"The same scheme is being reproduced, it is predictable - accuse Moscow of something at the beginning, and do this in such a way that an extremely credulous, unprofessional audience is needed to perceive everything that is served up from Washington as arguments, and then take real steps, which means implementing the course to ensure U.S. dominance in all environments of future combat operations, including in space," he said.
"This is an example of this approach. We will expose it, show the countries of the global majority [and] all unbiased observers who do not take the disinformation flows coming from Washington for granted what this kind of line leads to," Ryabkov said.
Russia will continue its efforts to prevent the deployment of offensive weapons in space, for which Moscow uses diplomatic tools, both bilaterally and in international formats, Ryabkov said.