President Obama is downplaying a report he offered to back off deploying a new missile system in Eastern Europe if Russia would help stop Iran from developing long-range weapons or nuclear warheads. The New York Times reported Tuesday the offer was relayed in a secret letter hand-delivered to President Dmitri Medvedev by top administration officials three weeks ago. President Obama responded at the White House.

President Obama: “What we had was a very lengthy letter talking about a whole range of issues, from nuclear proliferation to how are we going to deal with a set of common security concerns along the Afghan border and terrorism. And what I said in the letter is the same thing that I’ve said publicly, which is that the missile defense that we have talked about deploying is directed towards not Russia, but Iran.”