MOSCOW, September 16 (RIA Novosti) – Ukraine’s non-nuclear status, sealed in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) cannot be revised, and any talk on the issue is baseless, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told RIA Novosti.
“We assume that Ukraine’s status of a non-nuclear state as signatory to the NPT treaty was sealed once and for all and cannot be revised,” he said in an interview.
Ryabkov also touched upon the Budapest Memorandum of 1994. “I must emphasize that the ongoing attempts to accuse Russia of violating the provisions of the Budapest Memorandum of 1994 … we strongly reject. We explained why Russia has not violated and could not violate any provision of the Budapest Memorandum,” the minister said.
“This, in turn, means that we expect from all the other signatories of this document, including of course Ukraine, which joined the NPT, unshakable compliance to its obligations,” Ryabkov added.
On December 1994, Russia, the United States and the United Kingdom signed the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances providing security assurances against the threat or use of force against Ukraine’s territory or political independence. On the same day, Ukraine joined the NPT as a non-nuclear weapon state.
