RUSSIA: MOSCOW: SYRIAN PRESIDENT ASSAD VISIT

Описание: (6 Jul 1999) English/Nat

Syrian president Hafez Assad began top level talks in Moscow on Tuesday expected to focus on the Middle East peace process and Syrian arms deals with Russia.

Assad has been to Russian fourteen times, but his arrival in Moscow now is his first visit to Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

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President Assad of Syria kickstarted his visit to Russia on Tuesday with a visit to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Kremlin.

Accompanied by the pomp of a Russian military band, the ageing president, a stalwart of Middle East politics, paid his respects by laying a wreath.

Later, Assad entered the Kremlin for face-to-face talks with Russian president Boris Yeltsin.

Reports in the western press suggested Assad was after a 1.5 (b) billion U-S dollars arms deal with Russia, in particular including the purchase of Russian Su27 fighters and T80 tanks.

However, there will be tough negotiating, as Syria still owes 9 (b) billion dollars to Moscow from earlier arms deals with the Soviet Union.

Syria was a major market for Soviet weapons during the Cold War and an estimated 90 percent of its military hardware was built in Russia or the Soviet Union.

Russia and Syria have sought to boost ties in recent years.

This May, Russia and Syria signed a 10-year deal on cooperating in the peaceful use of nuclear power.

But the United States then placed sanctions on three Russian companies involved in the sale of anti-tank weapons to Syria, and then threatened to cancel 50 (m) million dollars in aid to Russia if the deal was completed.

The contract apparently never went through because Assad abruptly canceled a planned trip to Moscow in May after the Russian government would not promise to finalise the delivery of the weapons.

Assad is also due to meet Russian premier Sergei Stepashin before leaving Russia on Tuesday.

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