Soviets Seek New Afghan Negotiations : Kremlin Diplomat Says U.S., Pakistan Destroyed Treaty

The Soviet Union’s ambassador to Afghanistan said Saturday that massive shipments of arms by Pakistan and the United States to Muslim rebels fighting the Afghan government had virtually destroyed the agreement providing for the withdrawal of Soviet forces from the country. He called for new negotiations among the nations involved in the dispute.

Yuli M. Vorontsov, who is a first deputy Soviet foreign minister as well as ambassador to Kabul, blamed Pakistan and the United States for the Soviet decision, announced here Friday, to suspend further troop withdrawals because of the deteriorating military situation in Afghanistan.

He accused Washington and Islamabad of “deception” in signing the agreement in Geneva last April and then beginning large shipments of modern weapons to the rebel moujahedeen , who have launched an offensive to capture the areas from which Soviet forces withdrew over the past six months.

Proposes U.N. Mediation

Vorontsov, in calling for new negotiations, proposed that Javier Perez de Cuellar, the U.N. secretary general, act as mediator.

“In the opinion of the Soviet and the Afghan leadership, the time is ripe for a new international discussion of all aspects of the situation in Afghanistan and around it,” he told members of the Afghan Parliament in Kabul, according to a report by the official Soviet news agency Tass.

“We are facing fraud on the part of the United States and Pakistan,” Vorontsov said. “It becomes ever more apparent that (they), although signatories to the accord, do not intend to implement their provisions.

“Those who said they are interested in peace in Afghanistan started mass deliveries of modern weapons to the detachments of the (rebel) opposition. So there is direct evidence of deception on the part of Pakistan and the United States. This is a very serious blow to the Geneva accords, a blow that almost torpedoes them.”

Signed by Afghanistan and Pakistan and formally guaranteed by the Soviet Union and the United States, the accords require the Soviet forces in Afghanistan--100,300 troops on May 15, when the agreement went into effect--to be withdrawn within nine months.

However, with weapons deliveries and other support for the moujahedeen offensive, Washington and Islamabad “egg-on the (rebel) opposition to continue the bloodshed,” Vorontsov said.

The United States maintains that the arms it supplies the moujahedeen are a response to the weapons that the Soviet Union gives the Kabul government; Washington says that it wanted the Geneva agreement to halt all arms shipments but that Moscow refused, saying it had an obligation to its ally.

Vorontsov’s comments were probably the most critical yet directed at Washington by a senior Soviet official, and they reflected not only the deep frustration here over the continuing civil war in Afghanistan but a mounting bitterness toward the United States for what is seen as an attempt to humiliate the Soviet Union with a rapid rebel victory.

By announcing that it was suspending further troop withdrawals, which were to begin in 10 days and to be completed by Feb. 15 under terms of the Geneva agreement, Moscow clearly intends to put pressure on Washington and Islamabad to curtail the rebel offensive--at least until its forces are withdrawn.

More Advanced Weaponry

As required by the agreement, Moscow pulled out half of its troops between May and August, but recently it has replaced departing contingents with units possessing more advanced weapons, including the MIG-27 fighter-bomber, and has flown more missions from air bases within the Soviet Union.

Moscow also began deliveries of SS-1 Scud-B missiles, a fearsome ground-to-ground weapon that Soviet officials say has already been used against moujahedeen arms depots with devastating effect.

“The deliveries of new, long-range, powerful weapons to Afghanistan is a measure taken in reply to the intensification of the military operations by the (rebel) opposition,” Vorontsov said.

One of the Soviet Union’s most experienced diplomats with a reputation as a top trouble-shooter, Vorontsov was unexpectedly sent to Kabul last month. He was given a mandate to oversee not only the orderly withdrawal of Soviet forces after nearly a decade of involvement in the Afghan civil war but to try to bring the conflict to an end through negotiations that would establish a government of national reconciliation.