CHORNOBYL REACTOR TO RESUME OPERATION. Serhiy Parashyn, director of the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, told journalists on 14 April that the plant's third reactor will resume operation on 5 May following President Leonid Kuchma's directive to that effect, ITAR-TASS reported. The reactor has been undergoing repairs for the past nine months, and further repairs are planned for later this year. The first and second reactors remain shut down under pressure from the West, while the fourth, which exploded in late April 1986, is buried under a concrete sarcophagus urgently in need of reconstruction. According to Parashyn, the G-7 intends to pay Ukraine only $400 million out of the $750 million originally pledged to reinforce the sarcophagus. JM

UKRAINE, RUSSIA LAUNCH JOINT NAVAL MANEUVERS. The Russian and Ukrainian naval fleets began large-scale joint maneuvers in the Black Sea on 14 April. The two countries are deploying a combined total of 37 vessels in what a Russian naval spokesman described as "the biggest Russian-Ukrainian maneuvers since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991," AFP reported. The eight-day exercises will simulate pursuit of enemy submarines and include missile launches and parachute landings on the Crimean peninsula. JM