Russia test fires intercontinental ballistic missile

Russian Strategic Missile Troops ( RVSN) Saturday test fired a Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) to test its technical features, the defence ministry said.

"The Topol-M, a silo-based ICBM, was launched on Nov 1, at 9:20 a.m. local time (0620 GMT) from the Plesetsk cosmodrome in Russia's northern Arkhangelsk region," Xinhua quoted the ministry as saying in a statement.

The missile demonstrated its high precision capabilities with an overall good performance, as it hit a designated training target on Russia's Kamchatka peninsula.

RVSN spokesman Dmitry Andreyev said in August that steady rearmament of the RVSN is due to be completed in 2025 with the new- generation ICBMs, including the upgraded version of Topol-M.

The defence ministry said previously that Topol-M and Yars RS- 24 would be mainstays of the ground-based part of Russia's nuclear triad and would account for no less than 80 percent of the RVSN's arsenal by 2016.