Kiev tends to isolate Donbass

Kiev’s tightening blockade of Donbass leads to its further isolation — Russian diplomat.

Kiev’s non-fulfilment of the Minsk-2 package forces Donetsk and Lugansk to follow their own way, Russian Permanent Representative at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Alexander Lukashevich said at a meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council. The text of his speech was published on Friday on the official website of the Russian foreign ministry.

“Regrettably, we can note no positive changes in terms of lifting the financial and economic blockade off Donbass. On the contrary, it is being only tightened,” he said. “Such Kiev’s policy of ignoring legal rights and demands of Donbas’ population, evading direct dialogue with Donetsk and Lugansk leads only to the further isolation of that region.”
“Strengthening of direct dialogue between Kiev and Donetsk and Lugansk has a key importance for reaching peace and stability in southeastern Ukraine,” the Russian diplomat stressed. “First of all, it is applicable to the principal issues fixed in the Minsk Package of Measures as subject to agreement with representatives of these regions.”
One of such issues is “dialogue geared to agree the modality of local elections,” he noted. “Despite the urgency of the problem and Donetsk’s and Lugansk’s preparedness for joint work, no reciprocal steps are coming from Kiev. It has provided no reaction to the initiatives proposed by representatives of Donbas within the specially established format of the Contact Group’s working subgroups.”

Lukashevich recalled provision 12 of the Package of Measures reading that issues related to local elections are to be discussed and agreed with representatives of the certain districts of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions on the basis of Ukraine’s law on temporary procedure of local self-rule in the certain districts of the Lugansk and Donetsk regions, “which is not working so far.” “For some reason, our Western partners keep on overlooking it,” he said.

“Kiev’s efforts to impose unilateral decisions in violation of the Package of Measures are forcing the Donetsk and Luhansk authorities to follow their own path, in keeping with the corresponding provisions of the Package of Measures, including those on ensuring elections monitoring by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights,” Lukashevich said, adding that despite its loud statements on the implementation of the Minsk agreements, Kiev had failed to enforce the amnesty law.