Russia, Ukraine Promise to Split Black Sea Fleet
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MOSCOW — Russia and Ukraine promised Thursday to sign an agreement splitting the Black Sea fleet, attempting to thwart legislators interested in keeping the entire fleet under Russian command.
Details of the agreement between Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin and Ukrainian President Leonid D. Kuchma were scarce. But the plan faces an immediate hurdle: Russian lawmakers gave overwhelming approval this week to a bill that claimed the entire fleet as Russia’s property.
Kuchma and Yeltsin attempted to keep a step ahead of the fleet division’s opponents in a half-hour meeting at the Barvikha health resort outside Moscow, where Yeltsin is resting up for heart surgery.
Yeltsin promised to go to Ukraine to sign the pact.
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