MOSCOW, March 25. /ITAR-TASS/. An initiative from a group of Ukrainian deputies to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty has no practical sense, because Ukraine is unable to develop its nuclear industry from technological and financial points of view, says director of the Institute for US and Canadian Studies at the Russian Academy of Sciences.
“It has no relevant infrastructure, including that for the production of nuclear weapons,” Academician Sergei Rogov told Itar-Tass on Tuesday. “Ukraine will need five years as a minimum together with heavy financial expenses to create uranium enrichment capacities. The parliamentarians’ initiative is absolutely irresponsible.”
Moreover, such a step of Ukraine would curtail support from its Western sponsors, he said.
Colonel General Vladimir Verkhovtsev, former head of the Russian Defense Ministry’s department responsible for the use and maintenance of nuclear warheads, said in turn, “all nuclear weapons have always been produced and scrapped on the territory of Russia.”
“Ukrainian specialists were allowed to this process only once, in 1995-1996, when nuclear warheads taken from Ukrainian territory were scrapped,” he said. “By the way, today even fuel for Ukraine’s nuclear power plants is produced in Russia.”
If Ukrainians want to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, this is their right, but they should realize what consequences will follow, says the colonel general.