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Russian experts retain hopes for Geneva meeting over Ukrainian crisis

ZAMYATINA Tamara 
The four-party meeting of delegates from Ukraine’s new authorities, Russia, the European Union and the United States, due in Geneva on Thursday, April 17, was called with the aim to help defuse tensions in the southeast of Ukraine

MOSCOW, April 15. /ITAR-TASS/. The four-party meeting of delegates from Ukraine’s new authorities, Russia, the European Union and the United States, due in Geneva on Thursday, April 17, was called with the aim to help defuse tensions in the southeast of Ukraine, which is pretty close to a civil war, and in the country in general, engulfed in an acute political and economic crisis.

None of the participants in the meeting has any illusions as to the possibility of handling the tight bundle of contradictions in Ukraine overnight. US President Barack Obama in his last night’s telephone conversation with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin accused Moscow of supporting whom he described as “separatists” in the southeast of Ukraine. Putin replied that “the protests in Ukraine’s south and southeast are a result of reluctance and inability of the authorities in Kiev to take into consideration the interests of Russian and the Russian-speaking population.”

The White House’s confirmation CIA Director John Brennan had made a brief visit to Kiev last weekend merely added fuel to the fire. And the US and European Union’s sanctions against Russia over Ukraine clearly contribute nothing to the search for a way out of the crisis, to say the least.

It is quite significant that the new authorities in Kiev have mentioned the possibility of holding a national referendum on the same day with the presidential election, which might pave the way for a compromise.

The experts polled by ITAR-TASS Political Analysis Centre are unanimous that for the sake of overcoming the dangerous geopolitical conflict the European Union and the United States should try to shift to a constructive discussion instead of showering Russia with criticism.

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