Russia to send navy ships, planes to Venezuela (Roundup)

Sep 8, 2008, 14:27 GMT

Moscow - Russia said Monday it would send naval battleships and planes to participate in joint exercises with Venezuela in the Caribbean this year, a move that could exacerbate an already tense security balance with the United States.

Russian Foreign Ministry official Andrei Nesterenko said Monday the nuclear-powered missile cruiser Peter the Great, one of the world's largest battleships, and a unit of long-range anti-submarine aircraft would enter Venezuelan waters 'before the end of the year.'

The Russian statement came after Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced the arrival of Russian ships on national television Sunday, saying they would dock in the South American country by late November.

Chavez, who has spearheaded an alliance of non-aligned states against the United States, has sought closer ties with Russia including by making several large weapons purchases in recent years.

Nesterenko told journalists in Moscow the exercises were 'not connected to the present crisis in the Caucasus,' over which Moscow and Washington have traded bellicose accusations.

He said the joint exercise wouldn't be directed against a third country.

'The decision to conduct Russian-Venezuelan naval exercises was adopted at the meeting between presidents in July this year,' navy spokesman Igor Dygalo said.

While the appeared to have been agreed earlier the heightened tension between the ex-Cold War foes cast Russia's announcement as a tit-for-tat response to the presence of US warships in the Black Sea to deliver aid to Georgia.

It will be the first time Russia has held military manoeuvres in waters patrolled by the US Navy since the end of the Soviet Union.

Premier Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials charges Washington with encouraging Georgia's military actions, and said US aide shipments were an excuse to build up arms in the region.

Russia maintains a military presence just inside the former Soviet state's Black Sea port of Poti, where the USS Mount Whitney warship docked last week.