Agence France Presse April 13, 2007
Missile Defense Talks With Ukraine Not About Interceptor Plan: U.S.
The U.S. and Ukraine are cooperating on missile defense issues, but Washington has not sought Kiev’s involvement in a controversial plan to deploy anti-missile interceptors in eastern Europe, a U.S. official said April 13.
The discussions with Ukraine concern technological issues and relate to the former Soviet republic’s experience and capacities as a one-time base for the Soviet Union’s nuclear missile force, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“People have always talked to the Ukrainians because they, like the Kazakhs, have the actual ability to throw things into space,” the official said.
The official denied press reports in Ukraine and Russia that Washington had sought Ukraine’s involvement in a project to place anti-missile radar and interceptors in Eastern Europe — a plan that has drawn sharp protests from Moscow.
“That’s just Poland and the Czech Republic, that’s the only people we’re negotiating with,” the official said.
Washington wants to build a radar system in the Czech Republic and put missiles in neighboring Poland to defend against what it says are potential attacks from “rogue” states such as Iran.
Ukraine’s pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko also said April 12 that his country was not considering hosting any elements of a U.S. anti-missile shield.
“The question has not been put to us and Ukraine does not intend to examine it,” he told journalists.
The level of Ukraine’s integration with the NATO alliance is one of the key issues fuelling a political stand-off between pro-Russian and pro-Western politicians in the ex-Soviet republic.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other officials have adamantly denied that the anti-missile shield is aimed at containing Russia or undermining its military deterrence capabilities.
The issue is expected to figure prominently when Rice meets her Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, on the sidelines of a NATO meeting later this month in Norway, officials said.
The official said the press reports about Ukraine appeared to have been based on testimony in Congress late last month by a deputy assistant secretary of defense, Brian Green, the Pentagon’s point man for “strategic capabilities.”
Speaking to a House of Representatives committee, Green listed Ukraine among six countries with which Washington is “holding discussions or working on technology efforts with” concerning missile defense issues.
The other five were France, Germany, India, the Netherlands and Spain.
Green did not mention Ukraine as part of the separate effort to develop a missile defense shield based in Poland and the Czech Republic.
After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Ukraine found itself in possession of the world’s third largest nuclear arsenal, and about 30 percent of the Soviet military industry, according to GlobalSecurity.org.
© Copyright 2007, Agence France Presse
