A flexible Russian approach could delay US plans to unilaterally withdraw from the treaty if Washington and Moscow are unable to come up with a compromise replacement that would allow deployment of a national missile defense system.

"I have had discussions with Russian colleagues of mine who suggest we can probably do more testing than we think we can under the treaty," Powell told reporters aboard his plane en route back to Washington from Shanghai.

"We're looking at all of that," he said, stressing however that President George W. Bush would not allow the ABM treaty to "constrain" his plans for a missile shield that would be prohibited by the current accord.

Bush, who met in Shanghai with Russian President Vladimir Putin, has vowed to continue testing missile shield technology and warned that at some point in the near future those tests will violate the ABM pact, which Moscow believes is the cornerstone of its strategic relationship with Washington.

Bush has also said he will not violate the treaty -- a stance that means absent any deal with the Russians, he must notify Moscow that Washington intends to withdraw from the pact six months before the tests.

The first US test that could violate the treaty is tentatively scheduled for the second quarter of 2002.

The treaty, signed between the United States and the former Soviet Union, prohibits the parties from developing any wide-scale missile defense system. It had long been regarded as the key to the Cold War concept of deterrence based on the notion of mutually assured destruction.

However, with the Cold War over and the Soviet Union gone, Bush and his top aides believe ABM to be a hindrance to building defenses against possible missile attacks from so-called "rogue states" like North Korea and Iraq, which are not bound by the treaty.

"We must truly and finally move beyond the Cold War" and defend against "new threats," Bush said Sunday at a joint news conference with Putin in Shanghai.

Putin said he and Bush had "made some progress" towards resolving the dispute over the ABM treaty, but called the pact "an important element of stability in the world."

At the same time, Putin acknowledged the need to face possible future threats, and said Moscow is "prepared to discuss that."

Powell did not say whether Putin's talks of progress was related to his conversations with Russian officials about flexibility in the treaty.

But Powell did note that Bush had not, as many had thought, given Putin either formal or informal notice of withdrawing from the ABM treaty, and said talks with the Russians would accelerate in the days coming up to the two presidents' next meeting in November.

Powell said government lawyers would be poring over the treaty to see what could be done.

"They have their lawyers, we have our lawyers," he said.

He added, though, that the legal wrangling was another indication that the treaty was obsolete.

The treaty "is subject to enormous interpretation and that's why we think that it's time to move beyond it," he said.

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