MOSCOW. May 23 (Interfax-AVN) - Moscow is interested in extending the presence of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Ukraine's Sevastopol after 2017, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin has said.
"Naturally, it would be preferable for Russia to stay there longer, although Ukraine, of course, has the final say in this matter," Karasin said in an interview published in the Wednesday version of Rossiiskaya Gazeta.
Karasin warned against over-politicizing the issue of the stationing of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the Crimea.
"The fuelling of tensions around the Black Sea Fleet is a matter of not the legal quality of the documents but that of political positions and emotions," he said.
Karasin called for discussing this issue in a constructive way.
Russia and Ukraine signed an agreement in 1997, under which the Black Sea Fleet's main base in Ukraine's Sevastopol is leased to Russia for 20 years with possible prolongation of the term. The annual rent of about $100 million is deducted from Ukraine's debt for Russian energy carriers. In addition to Sevastopol, the Black Sea Fleet maintains two airfields and a ship basing point on the Crimean Peninsula.
The Black Sea Fleet consists of two forces - the Western one based in Sevastopol and the eastern one based in the North Caucasus.
The fleet commissioned several assault ships since the signing of the agreement with Ukraine. Among them are the Moskva missile cruiser (formerly known as Slava) and the Samum missile hovercraft.