Putin's Easter missile threat- DAILY NEWS

Putin's Easter missile threat VLADIMIR Putins war of words with the West escalated into war games yesterday. In a show of force, the Russian president
demonstrated his fearsome new Sarmat missile. Dubbed Satan 2 by Nato, it can travel at 20
times the speed of sound and carry 12 nuclear warheads up to 6,000 miles. The test launch, shown on an Easter message
video from the Russian defence ministry, came as Vladimir Putin ordered further cuts to
Britains diplomatic ranks in Moscow.

Meanwhile police in Salisbury are closing
in on the gang behind the nerve agent poisoning of double agent Sergei Skripal, and his daughter
Yulia, which has led to tit-for-tat expulsions. In the video, the Satan 2 missile emerges
from an underground silo, pauses as if hovering above the ground, and then speeds away in
a cloud of white smoke. The launch was at the snow-covered Plesetsk
spaceport in the northern Archangel province of Russia close to the Arctic Circle. The new intercontinental ballistic missile
was hailed by the Russian president as being able to fly over the North or South Poles
and strike any target in the world.

No defence systems will be able to withstand
it, Putin said during his state-of-the-nation speech earlier this month. As relations between Moscow and the West hit
a new low not seen since the Cold War, the Russian foreign ministry yesterday gave Britain
30 days to reduce the number of diplomats in Moscow to the same number that Russia has
in London. The UK expelled 23 Russian diplomats in the
wake of the Salisbury attack. So far more than 150 Russian diplomats, some
of whom are suspected spies, have been ordered to return home by countries including the
US, Germany, France and Canada.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said
Moscow would retaliate by expelling the same number of diplomats that each country had
ejected. The ministry said it had summoned the British
ambassador yesterday following the provocative and unsubstantiated actions by Britain, which
instigated the expulsion of Russian diplomats from various nations for no reason. The number of British diplomats that will
have to leave Russia was not immediately clear. A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: Its
regrettable but in light of Russias previous behaviour, we anticipated a response.

However, this doesnt change the facts of
the matter  the attempted assassination of two people on British soil, for which there
is no alternative conclusion other than that the Russian state was culpable. Russia is in flagrant breach of international
law and the Chemical Weapons Convention and actions by countries around the world have
demonstrated the depth of international concern. Mr Lavrov spoke of harsh pressure from
the United States and Britain under the pretext of the so-called Skripal case. He called for consular access to Yulia Skripal,
a Russian citizen, who has recovered sufficiently to be able to help police investigating the
attack.

Russia, he said, was also seeking a meeting
with leaders of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to establish the truth. Russia and the West are also at loggerheads
over interference in the 2016 US presidential election, cyber attacks, hacking and the war
in Syria. In his speech, Putin boasted: No one has
listened to us. You listen to us now.

He revealed other weapons his country apparently
has in the pipeline, such as an underwater drone armed with a nuclear warhead powerful
enough to sweep away coastal defences and destroy aircraft carriers, and a nuclearpowered
cruise missile thats invulnerable to any existing or prospective air and missile
defence systems. The White House responded by saying Putin
had merely confirmed what the US already knows  that Russia has been developing destabilising
weapons systems for over a decade in direct violations of its treaty obligations. Expected to go operational in 2021, Satan
2 is capable of wiping out parts of the planet the size of France or Texas, according to
Russian offi cials. If true it could wipe out an area the size
of England and Wales twice over..