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Miami, FL — U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) issued the following statement after the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) revealed the U.S. Government, including the U.S. Intelligence Community, “has assessed that Russia has conducted nuclear weapons tests that have created nuclear yield” and also expressed concerns about China’s lack of transparency on nuclear testing activities:
 
“Any Russian or Chinese nuclear weapons test that produces nuclear yield not only violates the ‘zero yield’ moratorium on nuclear weapons testing that the U.S., Britain, and France have faithfully implemented, but also imperils the national security interests of America and our allies around the world.  
 
“The U.S. assessment that Russia has conducted nuclear weapons tests producing nuclear yield is deeply alarming given Russia’s repeated and egregious violations of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.  
 
“President Trump, with the unanimous support of all NATO members, was right to withdraw from the INF Treaty after Russia’s material breach of that agreement, and is right now to direct his Administration to pursue a 21st-century approach to arms control that deals with a broader range of nuclear weapons and nuclear-armed competitors.”
 
Rubio is a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Majority Administrative Cochairman of the Senate National Security Working Group.
 
Related:

• February 1, 2019: Rubio Statement in Support of U.S. Withdrawal from the INF Treaty