KIEV, February 20 (RIA Novosti) - Ukraine's parliament will not support the foreign ministry's decision to commit troops to the peacekeeping effort in Georgia's breakaway republic of South Ossetia, the parliamentary vice speaker said Monday.
Adam Martynyuk said parliament "will know better than to send troops into an area where we are not welcome," he said.
Martynyuk's remarks came two days after the Foreign Ministry's statement that Ukraine could deploy a peacekeeping contingent in South Ossetia if the national parliament, the United Nations, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe gave it the go-ahead.
South Ossetia broke away from the Georgian government's control during hostilities in the early 1990s. As part of the 1992 ceasefire agreement that ended the fighting, Russia, Georgia and Ossetia each contributed 500 peacekeepers to the region. Georgia now looks set to increase troop numbers, and to replace the Russian contingent, whose expulsion was urged by Georgia's parliament last week, with an international force.
Georgia's U.S.-educated President Mikheil Saakashvili, who came to power on the back of the "rose revolution" at the end of 2003, has been maintaining close ties with Ukraine since the similar "orange revolution" protests swept pro-Western candidate Viktor Yushchenko into power in Kiev. The Ukrainian president has repeatedly pledged assistance to the Georgian authorities in settling conflicts, including with South Ossetia.
