RSS
DefMin Motoc: No talks about transferring US nuclear warheads from Turkey
Romania's Defence Minister Mihnea Motoc says there have been no political or specialist talks about a potential transfer to Romania of US nuclear warheads stationed in Turkey, calling media reports about that as rumours.
"What I can tell you is that there have been no talks, at political or specialist level, about that. There is no thinking, no plans to this end. So, absolutely, we can only call such reports as rumours," Motoc said Thursday in Buzau, where he attended Romania's 2nd Army centennial celebrations.
He also pointed to an official position of the Romanian Foreign Ministry, which categorically denies the allegation.
EurActiv.com on Thursday carried a story alleging to the US having started transferring nuclear weapons stationed in Turkey to Romania, against the background of worsening relations between Washington and Ankara.
EurActiv quotes a source as saying the transfer has been very challenging in technical and political terms. "It's not easy to move 20+ nukes," said the source, on condition of anonymity. Another source told the news site that the US-Turkey relations had deteriorated so much following the coup that Washington no longer trusted Ankara to host the weapons. The American weapons are being moved to the Deveselu air base in Romania, the source said.
According to a recent report by the Simson Center, since the Cold War, some 50 US tactical nuclear weapons have been stationed at Turkey's Incirlik air base, approximately 100 kilometres from the Syrian border.
During the failed coup in Turkey in July, Incirlik's power was cut, and the Turkish government prohibited US aircraft from flying in or out. Eventually, the base commander was arrested and implicated in the coup.
Whether the US could have maintained control of the weapons in the event of a protracted civil conflict in Turkey is an unanswerable question, the report says.
EurActiv also says Romania's Deveselu, near the city of Caracal, is the new home of the US missile shield, which has infuriated Russia.
The Foreign Affairs Ministry (MAE) on Thursday also rejected the information according to which the United States of America has allegedly begun moving nuclear weapons stationed in Turkey to Romania."The Foreign Affairs Ministry firmly rejects these pieces of information," MAE pointed out in a response at media's request.