On October 30 2001, a crowd of US and Ukrainian officials gathered in Pervomaisk, southern Ukraine, where, together with local schoolchildren, they set off an explosion that destroyed the last nuclear missile silo in the former Soviet republic.

The spectacular ceremony was supposed to mark the end of Ukraine's membership of the nuclear weapons club. But hopes it would lay to rest western fears that Soviet weapons left in Ukraine might fall into the wrong hands appear to have been dashed. At least 26 nuclear-capable cruise missiles, emptied of their atomic warheads, ended up on the international black market if allegations aired this week by amember of Ukraine's parliament are true.