MOSCOW. Sept 29 (Interfax-AVN) - Russia may fail to comply with its obligations to pull out ammunition from the self- proclaimed republic of Transdnestria if the republic's authorities do not allow trains with Russian materiel to resume departure.
"September or early October is the deadline for resuming the withdrawal of ammunition and other property of the former 14th army from Transdnestria. Otherwise, some decisions on changing the deadline or training schedule will have to be made," Army General Vladimir Isakov, chief of the Armed Forces logistics support department and deputy defense minister, told Interfax- Military News Agency on Monday.
Under the obligations that Russia assumed at the OSCE summit in Istanbul in November 1999, Moscow is to complete the withdrawal of its military property from Transdnestria before December 31, 2003.
"I have learned that Transdnestrian leader Igor Smirnov gave a go-ahead for a meeting with Russian officials and resumption of the withdrawal. If this information is confirmed through Foreign Ministry channels, I am ready to fly to Transdnestria for talks this week," Isakov said.
The deputy minister refuted reports of Tiraspol sources that Russia protracts the withdrawal by not submitting train schedules and requests for cars and locomotives.
"We cannot submit these documents until the political decision is made on resuming the departure of trains, or we will have to pay for a possibly long downtime of cars and locomotives," he said.
Russian ammunition withdrawal from Transdnestria was suspended in mid-June. Prior to this, two trains loaded with arms and munitions had left Transdnestrian every week starting in March. More than 30 percent of the 42,000 tonnes of materiel kept at warehouses near the village of Kolbasno had been withdrawn over that period.
The Transdnestrian administration blamed Russia's failure to meet its financial obligations for its decision to suspend the withdrawal. It said that Russia had promised to write off USD100m of Transdnestria's debt for Russian gas as compensation for the weapons pullout.
"As far as I know, progress is about to be made in solving the problem," Isakov said.
According to the Russian Defense Ministry, about 40 trains are needed to pull out the rest of the ammunition and other property of the former 14th army from Transdnestria.