Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: West ignores Russian threats, Lithuanian leader complains Date: Thu, 12 Nov 92 14:51:51 EST Message-ID: \SE A;WORLD \HD West ignores Russian threats, Lithuanian leader complains \BY Martin Sieff \CR THE WASHINGTON TIMES As Russia threatened to cut off energy supplies to Lithuania, the Baltic nation's prime minister said yesterday that he did not believe the West would come to his aid if Russian forces attacked the infant republic. Prime Minister Aleksandras Abisala, in Washington on a visit, also warned that Russian forces and military leaders continue to routinely ignore the sovereignty of Lithuania, a nation of 3.7 million people. Mr. Abisala will meet today with acting Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger and hopes to talk by telephone tomorrow with either President-elect Bill Clinton or Vice President-elect Al Gore. "We want to express our concern to Clinton and Gore that the West would do nothing" if Russia attacked Lithuania, the prime minister said in a meeting with reporters. "No one in Western countries would try to stop them. Yugoslavia's crisis shows this, unfortunately." He appealed for the incoming Clinton administration to "make it very clear to Russia there would be a cutoff in contacts and assistance" to Russia if it took any military action against the Baltic states and to offer U.S. aid to pay for the resettlement of the Russian forces in their own country. Last month, Congress made Russia's share of $147 million in aid for the former Soviet republics conditional on "substantial progress" in pulling its troops out of Lithuania. Mr. Abisala said the pullout appears to be proceeding on schedule. "Up to now they are going along with the timetable from Vilnius," he said. Russian troops must leave the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius by the end of December and the entire country by the end of August 1993. Mr. Clinton has said he is "concerned about the continuing presence of some 100,000 former Soviet troops in the Baltic countries." "This issue will affect the future of American relations with Russia, including U.S. assistance," he said in September. Russian military aircraft violate Lithuanian airspace between 10 and 20 times every day, routinely flying into Russian-controlled airfields there, Mr. Abisala said. "We don't control our own airspace," he said. "Each day we have more incidents. They don't inform our [air traffic] controllers of their flights or where they are going." Senior Russian government officials also routinely ignore the courtesies of Lithuanian independence, the prime minister said. Defense Minister Pavel Grachev and Deputy Defense Minister Boris Gromov both recently flew to Russian bases in Lithuania without notifying the Vilnius government in advance or bothering to ask for permission, he said. The Lithuanian government estimates that there are 20,000 to 25,000 Russian troops still in the country, down from a high point that was estimated at 80,000, but "nobody knows what numbers they have," he said. Lithuania estimates 300,000 Russian troops have been concentrated in the Kaliningrad oblast, or province. Kaliningrad is Russia's foothold on the southeast corner of the Baltic Sea, which is cut off by land from the rest of the huge Russian Federation, Mr. Abisala said. No one knows why the Russians have concentrated such huge forces there, he said. Mr. Abisala said the Western nations had given "too little assistance" to Lithuania. He said he was seeking $30 million to $50 million in additional aid from the United States. "It's not a big amount," he said. "It's mostly gesture." Mr. Yeltsin has said all Russian troops still in Lithuania will leave by the end of August 1993. But Mr. Yeltsin said last week that further withdrawals might be made conditional on Lithuania's willingness to pay world market prices in hard currency for Russian natural gas and oil. Mr. Abisala said in a meeting with reporters in Washington that his country remains totally dependent on Russia for its oil and natural gas supplies. Plans to build a new oil terminal near the main Lithuanian port of Klaipeda - formerly Memel - and a new pipeline to the country's main oil terminal have been held up by environmental opposition from the country's Greens and from industry leaders still looking to Russia, he said. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM