The possibility of a Ukrainian radar facility being used as part of a
U.S. missile defense system is being considered, Ukraine's ambassador
to the United States said on Thursday, according to RIA Novosti. Oleh Shamshur told a briefing in Kiev that the issue "is being discussed on the working level, at a preliminary stage."
U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs
Alexander Vershbow recently said the United States was considering
Ukraine as a possible site for a radar station as part of its new
missile defense configuration in Europe.
According to the U.S.
magazine Defense News, Vershbow "added Ukraine to the list of possible
early warning sites." He said Ukrainian officials "have mentioned"
their interest in participating.
President Viktor Yushchenko
said on Friday that Ukraine has not received requests from the United
States to host anti-missile facilities on its soil.
However, he
said Ukraine has two radar facilities - one in Sevastopol and one in
Mukachevo in the country's west, which Kiev would like to "integrate
into a European or global security system."
U.S. President
Barack Obama in September scrapped plans to deploy a radar in the Czech
Republic and interceptor missiles in Poland, due to a re-assessment of
the threat from Iran. Moscow fiercely opposed the plans as a national
security threat.
According to the Obama administration's new
plan, land-based missile-defense shields will not be implemented before
2015. Sea-based defenses will be operating in the Mediterranean up to
2015.
Moscow, which has consistently objected to the shield as a
threat to its national security, welcomed the move. Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev said later that Moscow would scrap plans to deploy
Iskander-M missiles in Russia's Kaliningrad Region, near Poland.
Medvedev said last November that Russia would deploy the missiles in
Kaliningrad, which borders NATO members Poland and Lithuania, if the
shield was put into operation.
