Central Europe Socialists reject U.S. missile shield

PRAGUE-Central European Social Democrat parties rejected on Thursday a U.S. plan to build part of its missile defense shield in Poland and the Czech Republic, saying it threatened to bring about a new arms race.Top Socialists from Germany, Austria, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Slovenia said after talks in Prague that any such system must not be built unilaterally or bilaterally."We are concerned about the decision to deploy the system and are at one with the large majority of our populations in rejecting it," the parties said in a joint statement, which was signed among others by Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer, Germany's SPD chief Kurt Beck, and Polish Socialist leader Wojciech Olejniczak.They called on the European Union, the NATO alliance and the NATO-Russia council to consult on missile defense.Beck said the statement was also a message to conservative German Chancellor Angela Merkel, with whom the Socialists jointly rule."We agreed we are against any new arms build-up in Europe," Beck said.The ruling Hungarian Socialists attended the meeting but refused to join in."The Hungarian Socialist Party believes that if Europe is exposed to a terrorist threat we have to defend ourselves," said Imre Szekeres, deputy party chief and the country's defense minister.

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