Charles Maines

The Kremlin maintains the opposition leader died from natural causes.

Charles Mainz, NPR News, Moscow.

Signed amid a period of detente with Russia in the Obama years, the New START treaty capped U.S.

and Russian nuclear warheads at 1,550 apiece.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had offered a de facto one-year extension to allow U.S.

and Russian negotiators time to work out a successor deal, yet President Trump never took up the offer, a decision the Kremlin said it regretted.

Trump administration officials are demanding that rising nuclear powers, particularly China, be part of any future arms control deal.

Meanwhile, both U.S.

and Russian experts warn that with neither country bound by limits on their nuclear arsenals, the risks of a new global nuclear arms race is only likely to grow.

Charles Mainz, NPR News, Moscow.

In a statement, Russia's foreign ministry called the Trump administration's pretext for attacking Venezuela unfounded.

It said if reports of Maduro's capture were true, the U.S.

actions marked an unacceptable assault on Venezuela's sovereignty.

Despite such expressions of support, Moscow has stopped short of challenging the U.S.

more forcefully.

amid a months-long pressure campaign by the Trump administration against the Venezuelan leadership.

The Kremlin reportedly rebuffed a request by Nicolas Maduro for direct military assistance in the fall, a result, analysts say, of Moscow's desire to maintain good relations with the Trump administration as it tries to broker its own peace deal for Russia's war in Ukraine.

Charles Baines, NPR News, Moscow.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov rejected the idea Russia had dismissed the U.S.

peace plan outright, saying Putin's give and take over U.S.