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Ministers at OSCE meeting urge to stick to Minsk deal commitments — diplomat

The Russian diplomat has once again stated that Minsk agreements "must be implemented in full"

BERLIN, September 2. /TASS/. Most participants in the OSCE informal foreign ministerial meeting in Potsdam spoke in favor of the Ukrainian settlement through a full implementation of the Minsk agreements, first of all their political part, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Meshkov told Tass on Friday.

"Ukraine was not discussed specifically," he said, commenting on statements by some participants that the settlement in Ukraine was the focal point of the talks.

He said the meeting had heard mainly declarative statements by representatives from different countries.

"The discussion was generic - on a need for an early settlement in that country on the basis of the Minsk agreements," he said in reply to the questions whether the deployment of an armed or police mission of the European security agency in Donbass was discussed as Ukraine had proposed earlier, or the timeframe for local elections in Donbass.

"It did not come to discussion on some concrete issues," he added. "Our approach is principled, and many participants in the meeting mentioned it - the Minsk agreements must be implemented in full," Meshkov went on.

"First of all this concerns the political part, the carrying out of respective reforms in Ukraine, the establishment of a direct dialog with Donbass, holding of elections in the region on the basis of a special law on elections," Meshkov said.

He regretted that "an entire set of their hybrid ‘obscene propaganda’ was used by Ukraine, as it unfortunately happens at different levels, including under the OSCE auspices".

The Package of Measures to fulfil the September 2014 Minsk agreements, known as Minsk-2, that was signed in Minsk on February 12, 2015, envisaged a ceasefire between Ukrainian government forces and the people’s militias in the self-proclaimed republics in Donetsk and Lugansk (DPR and LPR) starting from February 15, 2015 and a subsequent withdrawal of heavy weapons from the line of engagement.

The deal also laid out a roadmap for a lasting settlement in Ukraine, including local elections and constitutional reform to give more autonomy to the war-torn eastern regions.