New presidents in the United States and Russia have opened a historical "window of opportunity" to reach agreements on disarmament and other defence issues, Germany's foreign minister said on Friday.

In a speech at the start of the annual Munich Security Conference, Frank-Walter Steinmeier called on Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and U.S. President Barack Obama to overcome old Cold War barriers and build trust through new, shared projects.

"A historical window of opportunity has opened: a new president in the United States who is offering and demanding new thinking across the disarmament and security policy spectrum," Steinmeier told a security conference in Munich.

"And also a president in Russia who belongs to a generation that wasn't shaped by the Cold War as much as the prior one. He has also made proposals. My advice is to seize the opportunities that result. It is easy to perpetuate old ghosts, but this won't bring more security," he said.

Steinmeier was speaking at a panel on nonproliferation to start the conference, a gathering of more than a dozen heads of state or government. This year, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are due to speak.

POST-SOVIET TENSIONS

Highlighting the difficult security relationship between Washington and Moscow, the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan said this week after securing more than $2 billion in aid and credit from Russia that it would close down a U.S. air base on its territory that supplies U.S. forces fighting in Afghanistan.

Russia sees the territory of the former Soviet Union as its legitimate sphere of influence. Ties with Washington were also strained when it fought a five-day war last year with Georgia over a breakaway, pro-Russian province.

Steinmeier called on Russia and the United States to address together the divisive question of a planned U.S. missile shield in central Europe.

Missile defence has been a contentious subject between Moscow and Washington, particularly since the Bush administration sealed deals last year to deploy 10 interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic.

Moscow had threatened in response to install a missile system in Russia's Western outpost of Kaliningrad, near the Polish border, but a Russian news agency has quoted the Russian military as saying that it has now halted this plan.

"Russia has announced that it won't deploy Iskander rockets in Kaliningrad for now," Steinmeier said.

"To me, that's an occasion to also look again for shared solutions on the question of the planned missile shield in central Europe - between the United States, Europe and Russia. I stick to it: If we're dealing with common threats, common solutions must also be possible."