MOSCOW, October 12. /TASS/. State Duma’s first deputy chairman of Committee on Defense Andrey Krasov has described as "non-constructive" the draft law of NATO’s Parliamentary Assembly (PA) on sanctions against Russia.
On Sunday, NATO PA called on the member-countries of the Alliance to consider the possibility of toughening economic sanctions against Moscow if Russia does not fulfill its obligations on observing ceasefire in Ukraine’s east. The corresponding draft law may be approved today.
"I do not have an opinion on this because this is not a constructive position," Krasov said answering a TASS question. "We are talking about implementing the Minsk Agreements. First of all, Russia is not a party in the conflict on the Ukrainian territory," he said. The lawmaker added that Russia implements the agreements to a larger extent than Kiev.
"They were to adopt constitutional laws, which they did, but the laws were not the ones necessary," Krasov reminded. "They should have coordinated those laws with the [unrecognized self-proclaimed] Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics. It didn’t happen. They should have established contact with the republics. It didn’t happen either," he continued. "So here is the question. Who is really not implementing the Minsk Agreements?" Krasov said.
East Ukraine peace settlement
The Minsk accords were signed on February 12, after negotiations in the so-called "Normandy format" in the Belarusian capital Minsk, bringing together Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
The Minsk accords envisage ceasefire, weaponry withdrawal, prisoner exchange, local election in Donbas, a constitutional reform in Ukraine and establishment of working subgroups on security, political, economy and humanitarian components of the Minsk accords.
On September 30, LPR’s head Igor Plotnitsky signed the supplement to the Package Measures to fulfil the Minsk agreements of February 12, 2015 referring to withdrawal of tanks and of artillery with calibre to 100mm and mortars with calibre to 120mm.
The supplement to the Package of Measures on Implementing the Minsk Agreements from 12 February 2015 was agreed upon on September 29 at a meeting of the Contact Group on settlement the Ukrainian crisis, which was organised in Minsk (Belarus). The supplement envisages withdrawal of tanks, artillery weapons of less than 100mm calibre, and mortars of equal to or less than 120mm calibre to a distance of 15 kilometres from the contact line in Donbas. On September 30, the document was signed by DPR head Alexander Zakharchenko and LPR head Igor Plotnitsky.
In accordance with the reached agreement, tanks are withdrawn first, followed by artillery weapons of less than 100mm calibre and mortars. The first stage should start two days after the complete ceasefire and finish in 15 days. The second stage will take 24 days to complete. The withdrawal will start in the "North" sector on the LPR territory and will continue in the "South" sector in DPR. The whole process of withdrawal is expected to take a total of 41 days.