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1) Russian President Rejects 'Regime Change' In Iraq 2) Russia Prepares To Send Navy To Persian Gulf 3) Russian General Staff Proposes To Send Military Observers To Iraq To Avert War http://www.rferl.org/newsline/2003/03/1-RUS/rus-040303.asp Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty March 4, 2003 PUTIN REJECTS REGIME CHANGE IN IRAQ President Vladimir Putin told journalists in Sofia on 2 March that "international law" is the only basis for resolving the Iraq crisis, newsru.com reported on 3 March. Putin said the international community cannot interfere with the domestic affairs of any country in order to change its regime, and that the only legitimate goal the United Nations can pursue in this situation is the disarmament of Iraq. Putin added that leaders who violate laws should be punished by their domestic legal systems "except in very extreme cases." Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov spoke by telephone on 1 March with the foreign ministers of several current nonpermanent members of the UN Security Council -- Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea, Mexico, Pakistan, and Syria -- to discuss the Iraq situation, ORT reported on 2 March. Ivanov told his counterparts that Russia still believes in a "political/diplomatic solution to the Iraq crisis along the lines formulated by the [25 February] joint French-German-Russian statement". VY MOSCOW PREPARES TO SEND NAVY TO THE PERSIAN GULF Despite earlier denials, Moscow will send a naval group to the Persian Gulf, "Izvestiya" reported on 3 March. The Pacific Fleet has finished preparations to send warships including the cruisers "Admiral Pantaleev" and the "Marshal Shaposhnikov" to the Persian Gulf region, where they will rendezvous with a group from the Black Sea Fleet headed by the cruiser "Moskva." According to initial plans, the Pacific Fleet group should have set sail at the end of February, but now an unidentified source at the fleet's command in Vladivostok told the daily that the exact start date for the mission will depend on the situation in the gulf and on the decisions of the country's political leadership. During the war between Iraq and Iran in the 1980s, the Pacific Fleet protected Soviet shipping in the region, and in the 1990s, it helped monitor compliance with UN economic sanctions against Iraq, a fleet spokesman said. VY GENERAL STAFF PROPOSES SENDING MILITARY OBSERVERS TO MONITOR SITUATION Colonel General Yurii Baluevskii, first deputy chief of the General Staff, said that Russia has sent a delegation to the UN Security Council in New York to discuss the possibility of sending Russian military observers to monitor the situation in Iraq, ORT and other Russian news agencies reported on 3 March. Baluevskii iterated that Russia will not participate in any military action against the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, but said that Russian officers could "help monitor the situation around Baghdad." VY __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Tax Center - forms, calculators, tips, more http://taxes.yahoo.com/ --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.bdn7KI.YXJjaGl2 Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] TOPICA - Start your own email discussion group. FREE! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/create/index2.html ==^================================================================
