"It has been alleged that Kozyrev set out for Baghdad in order to appease Saddam Hussein so that he would repay these billions,'' Viktor Posuvalyuk, head of the Foreign Ministry's Middle East department, told a news conference.
Posuvalyuk, who accompanied Kozyrev on the mission to Baghdad, said that during the talks with Saddam, "we never touched upon the problem of debts, since at the time we had far more serious, far more pressing and urgent problems.''
He said their only priority was to ensure security in the region following Iraq's movement of troops to positions near the Kuwaiti border.
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