Ukraine Assures Russia It Will Hand Over A-Arms

In assurances to Russia and NATO made public Wednesday, Ukraine’s leadership backed down unmistakably from its worrying announcement last week that it was halting the promised transfer of its tactical nuclear arms to Russia.

Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin told legislative leaders that his Ukrainian counterpart, Leonid Kravchuk, has assured him in a telephone conversation that all the weapons will be handed over to Russia for destruction by this July, as agreed to late last year.

Kravchuk “rethought” his decision, the Interfax news agency reported Yeltsin as saying.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Anatoly Zlenko gave similar assurances to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization headquarters in Brussels, confirming in a letter that the transfer will be completed on time.

It was not clear Wednesday whether Kravchuk’s promise to meet the July deadline means that the weapons transfer will start up again immediately.

The Ukrainian leader had announced last week that he was suspending the transfer of the battlefield nuclear weapons because he had grave doubts about Russian security arrangements.

Ukraine had appeared to underestimate, however, the deep fear that the suspension would trigger abroad when it suddenly appeared that the nation of 55 million might be abandoning its announced goal of becoming a nuclear-free zone and planning instead to retain some of its weapons.

The renewed nuclear jitters played into general world alarm over the fate of the former Soviet Union’s massive nuclear arsenal in a region where frightening totalitarianism has been replaced by perhaps equally frightening instability and ethnic conflicts.

The suspension also appeared to bode ill for the Commonwealth of Independent States, serving as the latest reminder that member countries, 11 former republics of the defunct Soviet state, feel little obligation--and cannot be forced--to honor agreements they have made with each other.

Kiev’s move also increased the friction between Ukraine and Russia, the two most powerful states of the Commonwealth, with the implication that Ukraine might want to hold onto its nuclear weapons to defend itself against its giant neighbor to the east.

Leaders of the 11 Commonwealth states are scheduled to meet in Kiev on Friday to continue working out the shape of their loose association and, among other items of business, to re-examine an earlier agreement that former Soviet republics with nuclear weapons--Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus--transfer them to Russia.

Times special correspondent Alex Shprintsen, in Kiev, contributed to this article.