The Former Soviet Republics are Accused of Supplying Weapons to Rogue States in Defiance of United Nation or US Embargoes :: Charter'97 :: News

Donetsk, eastern Ukraine: US and British arms experts are combing the once-secret Topaz military electronics factory, trying to establish how many advanced Kolchuga radar systems it has produced. Company executives say four: three for Ethiopia and one for domestic use. But the US suspects there could be at least four more - and that they could have gone to Iraq.

The alleged $100m (э65m) deal is at the centre of a swirl of suspicions about Iraqi efforts to buy arms in the former Soviet Union on the eve of a possible war. In the past three years Baghdad has increasingly looked to Belarus and Ukraine for weapons. Russia, its traditional supplier, is committed to its new friendship with the US and reluctant to break the United Nations embargo on Iraq - although Russian arms still slip through to Iraq viaintermediaries.
The evidence against Belarus and Ukraine is mounting: alleged secret recordings made in the office of Leonid Kuchma, Ukrainian president; inter-cepted shipments; arrest of suspected arms traders; western intelligence reports; and Baghdad`s diplomatic manoeuvres, including posting its first ambassador in Kiev this summer.
A former senior Russian foreign ministry official says: "The Iraqis are active in Ukraine and they are active in Belarus. As well as weapons, they want technical support and training." Western analysts agree. "If anywhere in the former Soviet Union were supplying weapons to dubious countries, Belarus would be my candidate," says Julian Cooper, deputy director of the Russian and east European studies centre at Birmingham university. "Ukraine would also come under suspicion."
Mr Kuchma and President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus have repeatedly denied supplying weapons to Iraq. The western experts inspecting the Topaz plant have come at Mr Kuchma`s invitation and he clearly hopes the visit will clear his name.
Like Russia, Ukraine and Belarus do not feel bound by unilateral export bans imposed by the US on Iran, North Korea and Libya, though they claim to respect UN embargoes such as that placed on Iraq. But the temptation for cash-strapped factories is enormous: Iraq is ready to pay top prices. Much of Iraq`s hardware dates back to Soviet weaponry supplied before the Kuwait invasion in 1990. Only former Soviet Union plants can supply crucial spare parts.
Iraq`s success in re-equipping its military after the Gulf war defeat of 1991 is known only to Saddam Hussein`s inner circle. But there is clear evidence of Baghdad`s interest in securing equipment from Ukraine and Belarus:
* The alleged sale of the Kolchuga radar system in 2000 is mentioned in recordings allegedly made secretly in Mr Kuchma`s office and smuggled to the west by Mykola Melnychenko, his former bodyguard. The US says it has authenticated the recording.
* In a separate recording, Mr Kuchma can apparently be heard talking to Yuri Alexeyev, director of Yuzhmash, Ukraine`s largest rocket-maker, which was for a time run by Mr Kuchma before he entered politics. In a barely audible exchange, the two men are heard referring to Iraq, Iran and rockets. Mr Kuchma and Mr Alexeyev deny having the conversation.
* In August police arrested a Russian-Canadian man in Germany and two other people in the Czech Republic suspected of organising illegal arms exports from Russia, Ukraine and Bulgaria to the Middle East. According to Czech prosecutors, shipments to Iraq included Russian-made Mi-8 and Mi-17 combat helicopters, Kalashnikov rifles, anti-tank grenades and mobile anti-aircraft missile systems.
* In February, Steven Pifer, a senior US State Department official on a visit to Minsk, accused Belarus of involvement in arms transfers and military training for so-called rogue states, including the reported training of Iraqis in operating S-300 missile defence systems. Mr Pifer repeated the general claims on a second visit in August.

* Tony Blair accused Belarus of supplying arms to Iraq in his recent report on Iraqi military capabilities. His evidence included a 1998 report from United Nations inspectors in Iraq who found Belarus-made equipment in an artillery factory.
In addition to these alleged clandestine activities, Iraq has been strengthening its public links with both Ukraine and Belarus. Baghdad this summer posted as ambassador in Kiev Mozhar al-Duri, a former diplomat in Moscow said by Russian officials to be close to Mr Hussein. There have been frequent visits by Iraqi officials to Minsk, including two trips since July by Tawwab Huwaysh, the deputy prime minister and military industry minister. These initiatives are reciprocated. Ukraine has announced plans for a trade mission in Baghdad. Belarus has signed economic co-operation agreements.
Iraq is not the only black-listed arms buyer to be linked with Ukraine and Belarus. Reports published by the UN Security Council detail illegal arms sales to countries in African war zones, including Angola, Sierra Leone and Liberia. The reports accuse Leonid Minin, an oil trader with Israeli citizenship from the Ukrainian port of Odessa, of playing a crucial role in two sales from Ukraine: 68 tons of arms to Sierra Leone rebels in 1999 and another 113 tons of bullets in 2000. He alleged the shipments were directed by the son of the head of Ukraine`s main intelligence agency, the Security Service (see right).
Odessa, a Black Sea port known for its commercial connections with the Middle East and its organised crime, is widely regarded as a centre of illicit trade, including in arms.
The Financial Times has learnt that a delegation from Afghanistan`s former Taliban government, accompanied by two individuals from the al-Qaeda terrorist network, travelled to both Odessa and Kiev in September 1999 in search of arms, including aircraft parts, and pilot training. The delegation, led by Abdul-Rahman Zahed, the Taliban`s deputy minister of foreign affairs, were received by senior officials, according to two people who were there. The visit was made before a UN arms embargo was imposed on the Taliban. Ukraine has also engaged in other deals that, although not illegal, raise concerns. A report prepared this year for the UN`s international war crimes court for the former Yugoslavia found that Ukraine secretly supplied two helicopters and spare parts to Belgrade in 1999, just before the launch of raids by Serbian forces in Kosovo that led to the reimposition of UN sanctions on Yugoslavia. kraine and Belarus are not the only suppliers of arms to rogue states. Last year a Ukrainian-run cargo aircraft was detained at the Bulgarian port of Burgas, loaded with Czech-made Kalashnikovs bound for Eritrea. Russia also looms large in the illegal arms trade, both directly and through its extensive ties with Ukraine and Belarus. Plants across the former Soviet Union depend on each other for parts, with non-Russian factories particularly reliant on Russia.
Like Ukraine and Belarus, Russia has a limited definition of the rogue customer. In the past five years 18 Russian factories have been criticised by the US for supplying states blacklisted by Washington, such as Iran.
Yuri Khozyairov, a state secretary and deputy chairman of the government`s military and technical co-operation commission, wrote recently in a report for Cast, a Russian defence industry research group, that Russia must lobby internationally to stop the creation of "blacklists of arms importers that may include Russia`s traditional partners . . . such as Syria, Libya, Iran, North Korea and Cuba".
In common with its neighbours, Russia has poorly controlled stockpiles of Soviet-era weapons, especially small arms. Many weapons circulating in the Caucasus today, including in Chechnya, date from the cold war era, having passed through the hands of many intermediaries. For example, the two Russian helicopters shot down by Chechen rebels in the past two months were both hit by Russian-made SAM missiles.
Despite the efforts of Vladimir Putin, Russian president, to reassert the Kremlin`s authority, much of the arms market remains obscure. The country harbours at least one fugitive from international justice, Victor Bout. Mr Bout, described in the UN reports as the most active supplier of weapons to African war zones, is at large in Moscow, even though the Belgian auth-orities in February issued an international arrest warrant, accusing him of laundering arms-trafficking income. Mr Bout denies the charges but in October 2001 a UN report said he was continuing to traffic arms through subcontractors in Russia and South Africa.
Nevertheless, there is progress. It is now seven years since the last big seizure of Iraq-bound Russian military equipment, when Jordanian officials intercepted a shipment of 240 missile guidance gyroscopes and accelero-meters. Another 200 units were later found by UN weapons inspectors dumped near Baghdad. Andrei Beliyaninov, director-general of Rosoboron-export, says: "Russia is part of inter-national society and respects inter-national laws. We think our controls are the toughest in the world."
Russia, Ukraine and Belarus all face huge economic pressures in their arms industries. Gone are the days of the cold war, when the Soviet Union subsidised huge weapons programmes and supplied arms to its own forces and to allies for political ends. Today, hard cash is everything. Domestic arms purchases have almost disappeared and large swaths of the industry have collapsed, leaving surviving plants desperately chasing contracts abroad. Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, the three biggest Soviet-era producers, together exported weapons worth more than $5bn last year, not counting undisclosed deals, and want to increase sales in future.
Russia concentrates on its most important clients, China and India - buyers with increasingly sophisticated, and expensive, demands for the latest aerospace technology. Ukraine and Belarus have less to offer these clients. Lacking Russia`s natural resources, they are more dependent on arms exports and less squeamish about their customers. Also, while corruption is rife in Russia, it is more ingrained in these chaotic and impoverished states.
International pressure to restrict arms exports seems to have had little effect on Belarus, whose president appears to revel in his pariah status. Ukraine`s position is more complex because Mr Kuchma is torn between loyalty to his Slav neighbours and a pro-west drive, which includes an aspiration to join Nato. That is why he has invited the inspectors to the Topaz factory - and why he will be anxious about their verdict.