Russia officially withdraws from European arms control treaty

Russian President Vladimir Putin made Russia's withdrawal from the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty) official on Monday.
The law he signed, which parliament had already rubber-stamped in mid-May, was published online on Russia's legal portal.
The CFE Treaty, signed in 1990, sets the ceilings for the stationing of heavy weapons on the European continent. These include battle tanks and infantry fighting vehicles, heavy artillery, combat aircraft and helicopters.
Moscow was one of the co-signatories of the agreement in 1990 but put most of its implementation on hold in 2007.
Since 2015, one year after the annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, Russia has also no longer participated in the meetings of the advisory group.
After the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Putin called on his country's defence companies to massively ramp up production.
Since then, many companies in the sector have been working in multiple shifts to meet the Russian army's demand for ammunition and weapons - including heavy weapons.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has now also said that the termination of the treaty will have "no direct consequences."
"By terminating the CFE Treaty, Russia removes from the agenda a document that no longer reflects reality, but does not end the dialogue on conventional arms control," said Konstantin Kosachev, a Russian foreign policy specialist and deputy head of the Federation Council, the upper house in the Russian parliament.