The U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has strongly criticized President Barack Obama’s “breathtaking weakness” towards Moscow, following Obama’s appeal for more "flexibility" from President Medvedev on missile defense, in an article published on the Foreign Policy magazine website on Tuesday.
Romney’s opinion piece, titled “Bowing to the Kremlin,” came after Obama’s remarks were overheard on an open microphone at a nuclear security summit in Seoul on Monday.
“President Obama has already been pliant on missile defense and other areas of nuclear security, Romney wrote. "Without extracting meaningful concessions from Russia, he abandoned our missile defense sites in Poland. He granted Russia new limits on our nuclear arsenal. He capitulated to Russia's demand that a United Nations resolution on the Iranian nuclear-weapons program exclude crippling sanctions.”
Romney also hit out at Moscow, saying the Russian government had rewarded U.S. concessions “with nothing but obstructionism at the United Nations on a whole raft of issues.”
“It has continued to arm the regime of Syria's vicious dictator and blocked multilateral efforts to stop the ongoing carnage there… For three years, the sum total of President Obama's policy toward Russia has been: "We give, Russia gets."
Romney said in an interview with CNN on Tuesday’s that Russia “lines up with the world's worst actors” including Syria and Iran and served as the U.S. “number one geopolitical foe.”
Medvedev quickly responded by advising Romney to “to use his head” before making "Hollywood" style statements.
Romney's criticism was echoed by a group of 43 Republican senators, who signed a letter on Tuesday saying they would oppose any attempt to limit U.S. missile defense capabilities.
