"The initiative is part of Canada's pledge to contribute up to one billion dollars over 10 years, under the G8-led Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction," Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew said in a statement.

The funds will be used to tow eight of the Victor Class submarines to the Zvezdochka shipyard where four will be defuelled, and three of them fully dismantled.

Some 49 submarines from Russia's Northern Fleet retired from the Barents Sea are currently waiting to be dismantled, according to the statement.

"Canada is also working through the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to ensure that the spent nuclear fuel removed from the submarines is safely secured and stored."

Canada's Global Partnership Program expects to dismantle 12 of the submarines over four years, at a cost of some 116 million dollars.

The assistance agreement was signed in June 2004 at the G8 Sea Island summit.

Other countries involved in the dismantlement efforts are the United States, Britain, Norway, Japan and Germany.

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