Secretary of State James A. Baker III today proposed that 35 foreign ministers from East and West meet in New York in late September to plan a summit meeting by the end of the year. Baker put the proposal to a NATO session meeting in Brussels to discuss security in a changing Europe. The objective of the summit would be the signing of a treaty to sharply reduce troops, tanks, artillery and other non-nuclear arms in Europe. The NATO foreign ministers took no direct action on Baker's proposal for preparations in New York, according to Italian and other European sources. His initiative confirms President Bush's determination to conclude the treaty being negotiated by NATO and the Warsaw Pact by year's end. The accord would set a limit of 195,000 Soviet troops outside Soviet borders and 225,000 U.S. troops in Western and Central Europe. The 35 nations include all the European states except Albania, along with the United States and Canada. In 1975 they signed the Helsinki agreement to lessen tensions in Europe. ``We are all of the opinion that (the summit) must be thoroughly prepared,'' West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher told reporters. He reiterated Bonn's position that the 35-mation grouping, known as Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, must be given more weight in Europe's future. Baker, flying to Brussels on Wednesday from Washington, enthusiastically endorsed the proposition. He said a larger role by the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe was part of the ``new security architecture'' for Europe that he first proposed in a Berlin speech in December. NATO Secretary General Manfred Woerner said the alliance had agreed to accept France's invitation to host the conference summit in Paris. At the summit, the 16 NATO and seven Warsaw Pact nations would sign a conventional arms agreement. Negotiations on that agreement are now tangled over limits on aircraft and helicopters, and methods of verifying reductions within the two alliances.
