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ANALYSIS-Russia uneasy over U.S. hard talk on Iraq
November 28, 2001
By Richard Balmforth

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin's new friendship with the United States could be severely shaken if Washington presses for Iraq to be next on the anti-terrorist coalition's target list.

With a strong economic partnership at stake and the repayment of $8 billion in debt from Baghdad, Putin will be put in an awkward position if Washington seeks to extend its military campaign from Afghanistan to Iraq, analysts said.

"Putin knows that his political and military elite are watching attentively to see whether he will, or not, subordinate Russian policy to the U.S. (over Iraq) and he knows he should not do it," Viktor Kremenyuk, deputy director of the USA-Canada Institute, commented Wednesday.

In comments to Interfax news agency Tuesday, Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Saltanov reiterated Russia's opposition to any military action against Iraq.

"There would be a high probability of radicalizing the mood in Arab countries, further complicating the crisis in the Palestinian territories, and seriously destabilizing the situation in the Persian Gulf," he said.

Saltanov, who heads the foreign ministry's Africa and Middle East department, said there was no clear evidence pointing to Baghdad's involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and Washington.

Action against Saddam Hussein's Iraq, he said, would threaten the unity of the U.S.-led international coalition against terrorism, of which Russia is a key member.

RUSSIA FACING UNCERTAINTIES

The crisis following the Sept. 11 attacks has led to a realignment of interest between Bush and Putin, who quickly threw his weight behind U.S.-led operations against Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

But Putin, who shared a warm-spirited summit with Bush in Texas earlier this month, faces sceptics at home who feel he is giving away too much to Washington with little in the way of payback, analysts say.

The question of Iraq and what future direction the anti-terrorist coalition might take is just one of several uncertainties facing Moscow as the U.S. operation in Afghanistan shows signs of winding down.

Russia is hoping a stable, friendly government will emerge from the Bonn talks on Afghanistan's future which will leave it in a position of influence and end two decades of political and military failure in the region.

It has given Washington "carte blanche" to strike deals with the governments of former Soviet Central Asia to support its military operations. But it will not want any permanent erosion of its role as the dominant regional power there.

CLOSE ECONOMIC LINKS WITH IRAQ

Under Putin, Moscow's relations with Iraq have become centered on pure economic interest.

Iraq owes Russia an estimated $8 billion, largely for past arms sales, which has been a key reason for Moscow pressing for U.N. sanctions against Baghdad to be lifted.

Military action which engulfs Iraq is likely to end any chance of Moscow recovering this debt in the immediate future.

At the United Nations, Russia has urged the Iraqis to agree to a resumption of international monitoring to ensure Iraq has no weapons of mass destruction.

It has blocked so-called "smart" sanctions on Iraq, backed by Washington and London, which would ease the flow of civilian goods to Iraq but tighten military supplies.

But it has signaled its readiness to work out a deal with Washington to extend the U.N. oil-for-food program, launched in 1996 to help Iraq cope with the U.N. sanctions imposed in 1990 when Iraqi forces invaded Kuwait.

Boris Makarenko, deputy director of Moscow's Center for Political Technologies, said Bush was certain to face much more pressure on the Iraqi question from Arab coalition members, sparing Russia from taking a leading role.

"I don't think Russia will go as far as breaking the coalition in the event of Iraq being attacked. Again, the greatest strain on the coalition will come not from Russia but from the Arab world. It (Russia) will try to find a position of disapproval, salient but quiet," he said.

A comment Tuesday by Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov that "nests of terrorists" existed in other countries served to underscore Russia's view that there was no specific reason to target Iraq.

Makarenko said Ivanov's comment was clearly angled at Arab members of the coalition and not at Iraq.

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