Russia's lower house of parliament may ratify a new nuclear arms treaty with the United States on Friday, speaker Boris Gryzlov said on Thursday.
The U.S. Senate passed the New START treaty by a vote of 71 to 26 on Wednesday in what is seen as a major foreign policy victory for U.S. President Barack Obama, who is eager to "reset" relations with Russia.
Gryzlov said the text of the resolution approved by the U.S. Senate is not yet available to the State Duma but that it will arrive within a few hours' time.
"There is information that the resolution contains several conditions," Gryzlov said. "Unless the conditions concern the wording of the treaty, we may ratify the treaty tomorrow."
"However, if there have been changes in the text of the treaty, we will have to work on the issue," he added.
The treaty, signed by Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in April, has won the backing of the world's top figures, including NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
Obama hailed New Start as "the most significant arms control agreement in nearly two decades."
Medvedev also welcomed the move but said that "the parliament might need some time to study the legal aspects of the ratification by the Senate prior to making its own decision," his spokeswoman Natalya Timakova said.
MOSCOW, December 23 (RIA Novosti)
