Location of Sevastopol in Ukraine
Russia has reaffirmed itself as the preponderant strategic influence in Ukraine following the decision of the Ukrainian government to extend the lease of the Russian Black Sea fleet in the Crimea for 30 years beyond 2017.
Meeting last week in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkov, Russia’s President Dmitri Medvedev and Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovich signed the agreement which will see the Russian Navy remain at its base in Sevastopol, on the Ukrainian peninsula, until 2047.
Presidents Medvedev and Yanukovich also signed a gas agreement which will see Kiev receiving a 30 per cent discount on the cost of importing Russian natural gas from this month.
Despite a rumpus in the Ukrainian parliament – a smoke bomb was thrown and fighting broke out – both the Russian and Ukrainian parliaments ratified the agreement.
The Russian Black Sea fleet, which today comprises 50 vessels and 25,000 personnel, has been based at Sevastopol since 1783 following Catherine the Great’s annexation of the Crimea from the Ottoman Empire.
In 1954, Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev transferred the Crimea from the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, in commemoration of the 300th anniversary of the Treaty of Pereyaslav of 1654 which unified Russia and Ukraine.
The extension of the Black Sea fleet’s lease concludes a period during which closer relations have been forged between Moscow and Kiev in the military, aviation, industrial and nuclear spheres.
Over the next ten years, Russia will invest $40 billion in Ukraine’s gas industry while Moscow will also play an instrumental role in reinvigorating the Ukrainian aviation and nuclear industry.
Commenting on the Black Sea fleet deal, Russian Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said: “President Medvedev has ordered the setting up of a detailed plan of infrastructural development of Sevastopol, and of Crimea. This document suggests Russia and Ukraine will co-operate closely militarily.”
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who met President Yanukovych in Ukraine this week, said: “Military co-operation, without a doubt, increases trust between two countries and gives us an opportunity to do work full of trust in the economic and social and political spheres.”
