MOSCOW — In an effort to repair its strained relationship with Russia, the Bush administration announced Tuesday that it had combined more than a dozen bilateral issues into a single document that it hopes will breathe new life into intractable negotiations between the two governments.
But U.S. officials acknowledged they had made little progress on the most difficult issue blocking such a grand bargain: a new missile-defense system the administration plans to build in Eastern Europe, which Russia believes threatens its security.
The new arrangement, unveiled by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during two days of talks here, includes no new initiatives and, in some cases, restates existing agreements, such as those the two countries have reached on nuclear terrorism.
The document brought by Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates included areas of agreement and dispute as diverse as the missile-defense system, Russia’s bid for membership in the World Trade Organization and nuclear proliferation. The goal was to use progress on some issues as a starting point for talks that would help focus attention on the tougher questions.
