Ukraine shelves NATO membership plan

China says willing to work with India on UN reform
Beijing (AFP) April 6, 2010 - China said Tuesday during a visit by the Indian foreign minister that it was willing to work with New Delhi on UN reform but stopped short of backing its bid for a permanent Security Council seat. India has long voiced hopes for a permanent seat on a reformed UN Security Council, which currently only had five veto-wielding permanent members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States. "We understand the desire of India to play a larger role on the international stage," Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told reporters. "We would like to join hands with relevant parties, including India, on the reform of the United Nations (and) hope that relevant parties can have discussions in a patient and democratic way to reach a consensus on the issue." Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna was slated to hold talks on Wednesday with his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi, Jiang said. He will later meet with President Hu Jintao and Prime Minister Wen Jiabao.

The visit coincides with the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two nations, she said. Krishna's talks are expected to review negotiations over a long-simmering border row as well as trade issues, including India's 15.8-billion-dollar trade deficit with China, Indian officials said in New Delhi. Bilateral trade stood at 43 billion dollars in 2009 and is expected to reach 60 billion dollars in 2010. India and China have held several rounds of talks to resolve the border issue which triggered a brief but bloody war in 1962. Krishna was also expected to reiterate India's objections to Beijing's practice of issuing special Chinese visas for residents of Indian-administered Kashmir, which is viewed by China as disputed territory. For the past several months, Kashmiris applying to the Chinese embassy in New Delhi have received visas issued on loose sheets of paper and stapled -- rather than stamped -- into their passports.

by Stefan Nicola
Berlin (UPI) Apr 6, 2010
The Ukrainian president has dissolved the government's commission working toward NATO membership, a sign that the country's ambitious pro-NATO course is over.

Ukraine's President Viktor Yanukovych per decree dissolved the commission this week, in a move that buries the ambitious pro-NATO policies by his predecessor, Orange Revolution hero Viktor Yushchenko.

Yushchenko's stark anti-Russian course helped Ukraine win new friends in Europe but angered Moscow and alienated the country's Russian-speaking community. Under the new president, Ukraine could become a key link between both worlds, supporters of the new government hope.

Observers see the latest move as a bid to restart relations with Moscow, which strongly opposes Ukraine's NATO ambitions.

A Ukrainian expert said the move could strain relations with NATO.

"It's quite a sharp statement," Natalia Bugayova of the Kiev Post newspaper told Deutsche Welle. "Dissolving the commission which was to prepare Ukraine for joining NATO is quite a radical move and I think it will certainly exacerbate the relationship with the West."

Western observers, however, are not too concerned.

"NATO won't be too displeased because this step has been expected," Stefan Meister, a political expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations, a Berlin think tank, told United Press International in a telephone interview Tuesday. "Other cooperation with the alliance will not cease."

Ukraine, not a NATO member, has participated in every one of the alliance's major operations of the past years -- in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo and Operation Active Endeavour, the sea-based NATO anti-terror mission.

Kiev will continue this approach, said Kostiantyn Yeliseyev, the country's deputy foreign minister, but not press for membership anytime soon.

"We prefer to do our homework and fulfill our obligations instead of making false and empty declarations that we will be a NATO member on this or that date," Yeliseyev told the Euractiv news Web site.

Since being inaugurated in February, Yanukovych has made it clear he wants to improve ties with Ukraine's powerful neighbor Russia. At the same time, he has been careful not to alienate the West, choosing Brussels as his first foreign trip.

Meister said shelving the accession commission was a further sign of this diplomatic tightrope walk, a move directed not so much against NATO, but to please Moscow.

"Ukraine wants something from Russia -- and that's lower gas prices and financial loans."

Ukraine, a major energy transit country to Europe, has severe budget problems. It has trouble paying the bills for imported Russian gas, which has led to several price rows with Moscow. One such conflict last year temporarily halted supplies to Europe, damaging Kiev's reputation as a reliable transit partner.

Kiev will try to negotiate a new gas price deal with the Kremlin, and the latest step is expected to soothe Moscow, observers say.

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