Russia and the United States discussed nuclear arms control, NATO expansion and U.S. plans to build a missile defense shield on Tuesday in an effort to lay the foundations of a better relationship. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates met Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov after seeing President Vladimir Putin and president-elect Dmitry Medvedev on Monday. "We had a positive start yesterday and we look forward to further work today ... so that perhaps we can strengthen our partnership and overcome some of our differences and we can underscore the many agreements we have," Rice was quoted as saying by Reuters.
