BRITAIN and Ukraine have called off joint military exercises that were to begin next week, the Ukrainian Defence Ministry announced yesterday, as anti-Nato protests continued in the country.

“We have unfortunately decided, together with the British side, to postpone the Tight Knot 2006 military exercises,” Anatoly Gritsenko, the Ukrainian Defence Minister, said during a visit to Brussels. He said that a new date for the exercises, which were to begin next Monday, would be fixed later.

Mr Gritsenko said that the postponement was unavoidable because of a lack of approval from the Ukrainian parliament, which is required to authorise the presence of foreign troops on national soil.

Preparations for joint Ukrainian-US military manoeuvres, aimed at strengthening co-operation between Ukraine and Nato, will go ahead, the ministry said. It is those planned exercises that have sparked angry protests among pro-Russian opposition supporters in Crimea and elsewhere as well as testy remonstrations by Russia. Moscow has warned the US and Nato not to push too hard to bring Ukraine into their fold.

The anti-Nato protests, which President Yushchenko of Ukraine says are being encouraged by Moscow, have been taking place in Crimea for the past ten days.

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