DIPLOMATIC NOTE REGARDING UKRAINIAN LINK OUTAGE

C O N F I D E N T I A L KYIV 001714

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/02/2019
TAGS: PREL PARM UP
SUBJECT: DIPLOMATIC NOTE REGARDING UKRAINIAN LINK OUTAGE

REF: SECSTATE 93861

Classified By: Political Counselor Colin Cleary, Reason 1.4 (b/d)


1. (U) Embassy delivered reftel diplomatic note formally to
MFA on September 17. Embassy also delivered substance of the
note a demarche/talking points, along with an advance copy of
the note itself to MFA,s Arms Control and Military Technical
Cooperation Directorate on Monday, September 14. Embassy
raised the substance and discussed the ongoing outage with
Evgeniy Shendyuk of the Verification Directorate of the UAF
General Staff on both September 15 and 16.

Delivery Status
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2. (C) Embassy continues to pass NRRC messages per Washington
instructions directly to Verification Directorate head
Shendyuk, who travels across town (a journey that can take as
much as forty-five minutes or more in either direction) to
receive them in hard copy from us. On at least one occasion,
Shendyuk has postponed a hand-off due to the messages'
relatively low priority and the inconvenience of this
arrangement. This may raise concerns about technical
fulfillment of Treaty obligations.


3. (C) Reaction at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the
demarche was tepid, although the MFA had not been impacted by
the outage in any way. Two days later, Shendyuk approached
us to ask how Ukraine should pass its notifications to the
U.S. His leading questions conveyed a hope that Embassy Kyiv
would volunteer to take the information, format it and
transmit it via our own channels on the Directorate's behalf.
Our recommendation that the Verification Directorate deliver
outgoing messages via the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington
seemed to cause a logistical problem for Shendyuk, as he did
not know how to format the message so that MFA could transmit
it to the Embassy, and sought our advice on the problem.

Comment
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4. (C) Previous and subsequent discussions with Shendyuk
have not shed much light on what the real problem is;
however, there could well be several factors at work. The
Verification Directorate - which does not have an internet
connection and which communicates via a single phone/fax
machine - may be unable to pay the Ukrainian service provider
and service has been disconnected. It is also possible that
the interruption has something to do with the ongoing
negotiations with the U.S. NRRC over the cost of providing
service in the post-START future.


5. (C) It might be worth considering whether it is possible
to shift both sides of the communication equation (both
outgoing and incoming NRRC messages) to Washington, through
the Ukrainian Embassy, in order to increase MFA awareness of
the problem and potentially reduce the risk of messages not
being received promptly by the GoU in Kyiv.
PETTIT