aaus-list @ ukrainianstudies.org -- [aaus-list] ZLENKO DENIES SALE BUT SAYS CONVERSATION MAY TAKEN PLACE

[Taras Kuzio <t.kuzio@utoronto.ca>]

Ukrainian foreign minister denies country sold radar system to Iraq, though
president may have approved sale
Wed Sep 25, 3:02 PM ET

By ANDRES CALA, Associated Press Writer

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic - Ukraine's foreign minister says his
country's president may have authorized selling an advanced radar system to
Iraq but insisted the sale ‹ which would contravene U.N. sanctions ‹ never
took place. 


Foreign Minister Anatoliy Zlenko spoke to reporters in the Dominican
Republic on Wednesday, the day after the U.S. State Department said it had a
tape recording of Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma approving the sale.

Zlenko said the tape could have been made during one of the president's
discussions, but that it was "impossible to sell arms in this manner."

The tape, reportedly recorded by one of Kuchma's bodyguards in July 2000,
documents a conversation between Kuchma and Valery Malev, former head of
Ukraine's arms export agency.