With questions clouding his push for Middle East peace, and facing fresh challenges from US foes North Korea and Tehran, Obama will seek to highlight what aides hope will be an emerging foreign policy success: better ties with Moscow.

His task may be facilitated after Russian President Dmitry Medvedev indicated Thursday that he shared the same goal, saying: "We are ready to play our part."

The summit between the former Cold War foes "is a way of showing what that reset is going to mean in practice," said Stephen Sestanovich of the Council on Foreign Relations.

"There's been heavy use of that metaphor, but until now, not too much clarity about exactly what the reality of a new relationship is going to be."

Obama arrives in Moscow for private Kremlin talks and a press conference with Medvedev, who dubbed the US leader "my new comrade" after their debut meeting in London in April.

On Tuesday, Obama will share breakfast with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who many US observers consider still holds power behind the throne in Russia.

He will also pay his respects to former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on a trip that later takes him to the Group of Eight summit in Italy and a journey to Ghana.

Obama and Medvedev will seek to advance their quest to agree a replacement to the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), a cornerstone of Cold War-era nuclear arms control, which expires on December 5.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the presidents would instruct negotiators to keep working toward that goal, but he stopped short of saying there would be a concrete deal.

"I am certain that this treaty, in its final version, will establish all the parameters, including numerical ones," he said, asked about what numerical ceilings would be imposed on warheads and missiles in a new treaty.

"The talks are proceeding in a constructive and results-oriented fashion," Lavrov added.

While the main focus of Obama's visit will be arms control, Washington also wants Russia's backing on pressing global issues.

"We want to actually do real business with the Russians on things that matter to our national security and our prosperity," said Michael McFaul, senior director for Russian and Eurasian affairs at the National Security Council.

The leaders, McFaul said, would discuss Iran, Afghanistan, North Korea, European security and stopping the spread of nuclear weapons.

But talk of a new era of US-Russia ties comes with a caveat -- rarely have Moscow-Washington relations been trouble free since the Cold War thaw.

During the administration of former president George W. Bush, the relationship with then-president Putin frayed over issues like missile defense, Iraq and NATO expansion.

There is also the possibility that the "reset" button beloved by the Obama team may mean something else entirely to the Russians.

"There is a kind of asymmetry between the American and Russian anticipations and understanding of this metaphor," said Lilia Shevtsova, of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Washington, she said, views it as an instrument to pursue US interests on non-proliferation, Iran and Afghanistan, while Moscow sees it as a chance "to prove they have been right on all issues in Russian-American relations."

Obama is also likely to quietly press Russia for support on two boiling foreign policy crises -- North Korea's weapons of mass destruction tests and Iran's nuclear drive amid a political crackdown in Tehran.

Some analysts believe Pyongyang may try to force its way onto the US-Russia agenda with a new missile test launch in the coming days.

Russia is also a key player on Iran, at a time when Obama's engagement effort is being thrown into doubt by Tehran's suppression of post-election protests.

Senior US foreign policy advisor Denis McDonough said Wednesday Tehran would be "front and center" of Obama's agenda in Moscow and at the G8 summit.

Obama's visit comes as Russia begins its biggest military exercises in the Caucasus since its war with Georgia last year, which exposed divisions between Washington and Moscow.

earlier related report
Nuclear arms pact elusive as Obama visits Russia
US President Barack Obama faces one of the toughest diplomatic challenges of his young presidency next week as he seeks to persuade a reluctant Russia to salvage an expiring nuclear arms treaty.

Clinching a deal on the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), a landmark Cold War-era disarmament agreement that runs out December 5, would indicate that Obama's plan to "reset" strained ties with Russia has borne fruit.

It would also have far-reaching implications for global security and could boost Washington's hand in dealing with Iran and North Korea, experts say.

Obama, who arrives in Moscow on Monday, is expected to hold more than four hours of talks with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

A central topic of their discussions will be the future of START, which limits the number of deployed strategic warheads on both sides to 6,000 and the number of warhead delivery vehicles to 1,600.

Obtaining a new agreement would advance Obama's stated goal of achieving a world without nuclear weapons, said James Goodby, a retired US diplomat who took part in the original US-Soviet START negotiations.

"Because Russia and the United States together possess about 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons, it is important that they show leadership in reducing their own nuclear arsenals," Goodby said.

Moreover, close US-Russian cooperation would also make it harder for Iran and North Korea to pursue their nuclear programmes, he added.

"I think that will have a profound effect on the negotiating environment with those two countries," said Goodby, who is now an expert at the Hoover Institution in California.

In April, Obama and Medvedev agreed to work towards a successor treaty by December and pledged that it would include deep cuts in the US and Russian strategic arsenals.

But a huge obstacle stands in the way -- a dispute over a controversial US missile shield in eastern Europe which was strongly backed by Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, despite Russian objections.

The Bush administration enraged Moscow by ploughing ahead with plans to site anti-missile radars in Poland and interceptors in the Czech Republic.

Moscow says the US plans threaten its nuclear deterrent, though Washington denies that the missile shield is directed against Russia, saying that it is meant to protect against Iran.

Medvedev has vowed to retaliate against the US plans by deploying missiles in Russia's westernmost Kaliningrad region, raising the spectre of a new arms race in Europe.

The Obama administration has launched a review of the missile shield but stopped short of cancelling it altogether. Now the dispute threatens to torpedo progress on START.

Russia has said it will only cut warheads if the United States addresses its concerns on missile defence, and it insists that the new treaty must define the link between strategic arms and anti-missile systems.

There are some signs that the sides have been discussing a deal that might include joint US-Russian missile defences.

Konstantin Kosachyov, chairman of the foreign relations committee of the lower house of the Russian parliament, recently said the chances of agreeing a new treaty were "60 percent to 40 percent in favour."

Moscow's main goal is getting Washington to step back from its unilateral approach to missile defence, Kosachyov said.

"All we are trying to achieve now is to get the United States to agree that we'll cooperate on missile defence and that we won't take unilateral steps. I believe this is fully possible by December," he told Echo of Moscow radio.

Russian defence analyst Alexander Golts was more pessimistic, noting that neither Washington nor Moscow have budged on Russia's main demand: that the United States abandon its missile-defence plans in eastern Europe.

Moscow will continue to use the START talks to hammer home its opposition to the missile shield, he predicted.

"The negotiations will drag on very long, which corresponds to Moscow's strategy," Golts said.

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