BLACK SEA FLEET UPDATE.

According to Konstantin Zatulin, chairman of the Russian Duma’s CIS Affairs Committee, who is closely involved with the negotiations on the Black Sea Fleet, Ukraine proposes to charge Russia for the use of bases in the Sevastopol area an annual rent of 26 US dollars per square meter of land and 20 dollars per square meter of water. Zatulin thinks that "the current Ukrainian authorities" intend to "finish off" the Fleet through such rental rates. (13) Other Russian civilian and military officials, without quoting the rates that Ukraine proposes to charge after the fleet’s partition, have similarly concluded that they seem intended to force Russia’s portion of the fleet to either forego basic repairs or leave Ukrainian ports. In recent negotiating rounds, the Ukrainian side has firmly linked the question of compensation for the use of Ukrainian territory and infrastructure to the question of the division and status of the fleet.

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