KYIV. Feb 10 (Interfax-Ukraine) - Ukrainian presidential national security aide Volodymyr Horbulin has denied media allegations that Ukrainian scientists could have sold tactical nuclear weapons to Taliban representatives in Afghanistan in 1998 and that those weapons later fell into the hands of al-Qaeda.
"I can say that this is an absolutely talentless canard, which has yet again shown that someone in this world is eager to defame Ukraine," Horbulin told Interfax on Monday in comments on a report in an Arab newspaper.
The reports said citing sources close to al-Qaeda that this terrorist organization possesses tactical nuclear weapons supposedly bought from Ukraine. The reports referred to some unnamed Ukrainian scientists who visited the Afghan city of Qandahar in 1998, when Afghanistan was under Taliban rule, and its religious leader, Mullah Omar, then resided in this city.
"It is very difficult for me to comment on al-Qaeda's plans, because I really do not know anything about this. But I am absolutely sure that no Ukrainian scientists have been to Qandahar," said Horbulin, who was secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council in 1998.
Horbulin maintained that "everything possible was done so that no nuclear weapons would remain in Ukraine. We completed this on May 31, 1996. Those were the last nuclear weapons that were on strategic carriers, and before that, the same operations were conducted on tactical weapons that could carry nuclear weapons."
The presidential aide pointed out that any nuclear charges remaining in Ukrainian territory belonged to the Russian Administrative Nuclear Weapons Department.
"It was responsible for removing everything related to nuclear weapons and nuclear warheads from Ukraine," he said.