The only question is what, when, and where
President Leonid Kuchma was quoted by Interfax Ukraine and UNIAN as saying, during a meeting with his Macedonian counterpart Boris Trajkovski last Sunday in the Crimea, “Ukraine will uphold military and technological cooperation with Macedonia, taking into account the political accords between Ukraine and NATO.” Earlier it was announced that Ukraine is trying to begin a dialogue to find an optimum solution to the Macedonian problem, aware of the need to stabilize the situation in conformity with the universally accepted principles of international security. However, the international community in general and Macedonia in particular are interested to know whether the Ukrainian-Macedonian arms supply contracts will be carried out and how disputed issues concerning NATO will be settled. NATO, it was said, will be consulted with regard to “certain problems.” Meanwhile, the North Atlantic alliance opposes arms supplies to Macedonia, at least until the Macedonian parliament enacts radical constitutional changes.
The problem of Ukrainian-Macedonian military-technological cooperation did not just appear out of nowhere. Even when the cooperation agreement was signed two years ago, it was clear that regional instability would not be confined to Kosovo, and that some ethnic Albanian movements would sooner or later extend the scope of permanent warfare for their “right to self-determination” or “broader civil rights” to Serbia and Macedonia. This is precisely what happened, with Macedonia being technically unprepared, making Ukraine’s MI-24 helicopters and MIG-25 fighters a godsend.
Off the record, The Day was told by diplomats and experts from different countries that there were two problems to reckon with: (a) the West turned out unable to monitor arms supplies to Albanian groups in Kosovo and Macedonia, and (b) Ukraine could not or would not foresee all possible consequences of an otherwise perfectly legitimate action. The first arms supplies were delivered rather carelessly in diplomatic terms, one of the results being that Greece, even though frustrated by the Balkan situation, detained a Ukrainian Black Sea tank shipment. The problem was solved only with difficulty.
Under the circumstances, it is impossible to receive an unequivocal answer in Kyiv or Skopje to the question of how the Macedonian accords will be performed and what kind of weapons will be supplied. Skopje hopes that Ukraine will honor its commitments and says it understands Ukraine’s problems.
In fact, President Trajkovski made statements in the Crimea to the same effect. He assured those present that the two states have had excellent relations and that he hoped they would remain in the same vein. He thanked Ukraine for its help during the past seven or eight months, which have been especially hard on Macedonia, adding that in so doing Ukraine had made a substantial contribution in the struggle against organized terrorism, and that military-technological cooperation was actually a small part of the range of issues discussed by the presidents. Leonid Kuchma, in turn, said that Ukraine was prepared to dispatch observers to Macedonia, along with those from the EU and OSCE, to support Macedonia in international organizations, particularly the United Nations, and that the bilateral free trade agreement should be implemented immediately. This is the hitch. Ukraine ought to have learned its lesson from losing so many opportunities in Croatia and Yugoslavia, owing to its lack of a coherent policy. One cannot rule out the possibility of the Macedonian experience becoming yet another such lesson.
