From: clarinews@clarinet.com (GREGORY GRANSDEN)
Newsgroups: clari.news.gov.international,clari.news.military,clari.news.hot.east_europe,clari.news.hot.ussr,clari.news.issues.conflict,clari.news.politics,biz.clarinet.sample
Subject: War of decrees starts for control of fleet
Keywords: international, non-usa government, government, navy, military,
	war & peace, social issues, politics
Date: 7 Apr 92 18:31:35 GMT
Followup-To: biz.clarinet.sample
Location: soviet union
ACategory: international
Slugword: russia-ukraine
Priority: regular
Format: regular
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ANPA: Wc: 644; Id: z4626; Sel: xxigf; Adate: 4-7-230pes; Ver: ld
Codes: yigfrxx., yimnrsu., yixwrsu., yip.rsu.
Note: (complete writethru -- yeltsin issues decree asserting russian control
 over black sea fleet)


	MOSCOW (UPI) -- Russian President Boris Yeltsin issued a decree
Tuesday declaring direct Russian control of the Black Sea fleet one day
after Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk declared that his country
controlled the former Soviet naval unit.
	Yeltsin said he acted to preserve stability of the fleet and resolve
the uncertainty swirling around it, but the decree appeared to leave the
disputed status of the fleet in even more uncertain waters.
	Russia and Ukraine have been squabbling over the fleet ever since the
breakup of the Soviet Union, but the latest back-to-back presidential
declarations in Kiev and Moscow launched a war of decrees between the
two Slavic republics that are the most populous members of the
Commonwealth of Independent States.
	In a symbolic gesture to assert Russia's claim to the fleet, Yeltsin
ordered the historical Russian navy St. Andrew flag, established in 1699
under Czar Peter the Great, to be hoisted on the Black Sea ships.
	Yeltsin also said Russia would finance the fleet.
	Yeltsin said he was placing the fleet under Russian Federation
control ``in order to preserve stable control over the Black Sea fleet
and its fighting efficiency, to provide social defense of the servicemen
and their families, do justice to its historical traditions and because
of the uncertainty of the fleet status.''
	Kravchuk signed a decree Monday saying the Black Sea fleet would be
part of the independent Ukrainian armed forces but that some vessels
would remain under joint C.I.S. military command.
	While asserting Russian control of the fleet, Yeltsin said it would
be subordinate to the C.I.S. commander-in-chief.
	C.I.S. Defense Minister Yevgeny Shaposhnikov, who commands the joint
military and strategic forces, appeared before the Russian Congress of
People's Deputies earlier Tuesday to announce that Yeltsin planned to
take over the navy.
	The war of decrees over control of the huge fleet escalates a dispute
between the two most powerful former Soviet republics that threatens to
pull the Commonwealth apart.
	Both the Ukrainian and Russian decrees claim control of the entire
fleet in principle but say negotiations would be held on what part of it
might be transferred to the other republic or the Commonwealth.
	The fleet, with some 350 ships and submarines, plus aircraft, is
based at Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula, which is Ukrainian but
which is subject of a budding dispute between Russian and Ukraine.
	Yeltsin ordered the Russian Foreign Ministry and the Defense Ministry
to ``immediately start negotiations with Ukraine in order to determine
the conditions of basing the Black Sea fleet ships and vessels in
Ukrainian ports and transferring a part of it to Ukrainian armed forces.
''
	Russia claims the fleet is part of the former Soviet strategic forces
that C.I.S. republics agreed in December should remain under joint
control, while Ukraine contends the agreement on strategic forces only
covers nuclear weapons.
	The Military Council of top officers from the fleet said in a
statement reported by the independent Interfax news agency that they
remained under C.I.S. jurisdiction and were not authorized to transfer
any part of the fleet to Ukrainian control.
	The statement called for C.I.S. negotiations on the issue and said 
``interference in the fleet's everyday work and the decision to create
parallel structures may ruin control over it, spoil relations between
servicemen and destabilize the situation in the region.''
	Interfax and the Russian state news agency Itar-Tass said that the
Ukrainian air force command had ordered all aircraft from the Black Sea
fleet grounded Tuesday.
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