The US Secretary of State said his country will suspend its compliance with the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty with Russia.

The Trump administration claims Moscow is in breach of the deal.

The IMF, signed by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987, was a major step in the wind down of the Cold War.

It banned ground launched missiles with a range of between 500 and 5,500 kilometres.

The US will "suspend its obligations" from the deal tomorrow, and will formally pull out of the treaty in six months unless Russia "comes back into compliance by destroying all of its violating missiles, launchers, and associated equipment".

Announcing the decision today, Mike Pompeo said: "We have raised Russia's non-compliance with Russian officials, including at the highest levels of government, more than 30 times - yet Russia continues to deny that its missile system is non-compliant and violates the treaty."

"Developing our own military response options"

Donald Trump, meanwhile, claimed Russia had violated the deal 'with impunity' by 'covertly developing and fielding a prohibited missile system'.

In a statement released by the White House, he said: "The United States has fully adhered to the INF Treaty for more than 30 years, but we will not remain constrained by its terms while Russia misrepresents its actions. 

"We cannot be the only country in the world unilaterally bound by this treaty, or any other. We will move forward with developing our own military response options and will work with NATO and our other allies and partners to deny Russia any military advantage from its unlawful conduct."

In a statement, NATO said it "strongly supported" the US findings and called on Russia to "urgently return to full and verifiable compliance".

Before today's announcement, the Kremlin had confirmed it believed the move by the US was imminent.

In remarks quoted by the TASS news agency, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: "In general, the Americans’ reluctance to hear any arguments [and] their reluctance to conduct any substantive negotiations suggests that the decision to dismantle the treaty was made by Washington a long time ago."