The United Nations chief has called on Russia and the United States to resume talks to reduce their massive nuclear arsenals.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon made the call in a lecture at New York University on November 22.
The likelihood of Moscow and Washington opening new talks to cut their nuclear weapons stockpiles is highly unlikely given the increasing tensions between the two countries.
"The Russian Federation and the United States, which together hold the largest nuclear potential --I'm guessing, 95 percent of the world's declared atomic weapons are located in these two countries -- should resume a genuine dialogue to cut all types of nuclear weapons," he said.
The New START treaty obligates the two sides to cut their deployed nuclear warheads to 1,550, as well as cuts to deployed and non-deployed strategic delivery vehicles and launchers by 2018.
The U.S. stockpile is well below that limit, but there's growing unease among some U.S. defense experts that Russia has no intention of meeting that goal.