“If Russia is a member of the international community it will not ignore it,” the official stated. “I don’t think that there will be people in Russia that would behave like that,” the minister added.

Two decisions of the Ukrainian National Security and Defence

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Council on movements of the Black Sea Fleet’s units were made valid by President Yushchenko’s decrees of August 13.

According to them, the Black Sea Fleet command should request permission of Ukraine’s General Staff for the crossing of Ukraine’s border by naval ships or planes no less than 72 hours in advance. The document should specify what arms and ammunition, explosives and military equipment are carried. If consent is granted, the Black Sea Fleet command should notify of this the headquarters of the Azov-Black Sea regional agency of the state border service and the appropriate customs body of Ukraine no less than 24 hours in advance of naval ships’ departure.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko’s decree seeking to unilaterally regulate the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s stay in Ukraine “runs counter to the spirit and letter of the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Partnership between Russia and Ukraine of 1997,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday. It described the decree as a new serious anti-Russian move.

“The purpose of the novelties is to create serious complications for the practical operation of the fleet in direct violation of the base agreements between Moscow and Kiev on the status and terms of the stay of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Ukraine of 1997,” the ministry said.

“The Ukrainian leadership has taken a new serious anti-Russian step. Moscow regards these actions by the leadership of Ukraine as contradicting to the spirit and letter of the abovementioned agreements and the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Partnership between Russia and Ukraine of 1997,” the ministry stated.

“It is bewildering that the Ukrainian side again failed to bother to observe even elementary diplomatic decorum and discuss this problem within the framework of the Russian-Ukrainian interstate commission,” the ministry noted. “And did so despite the fact that the president of Russia recently made it clear to Yushchenko that such practice would be unacceptable,” according to the ministry.