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Putin supports plans of OSCE armed mission in Ukraine — Kremlin

The Kremlin spokesman notes the idea of the OSCE police mission in Ukraine still lacks content

MOSCOW, October 24. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin has supported the idea of an OSCE police mission in Ukraine by and large, but these plans still lack specific content, the Kremlin has said.

"It is true that President Putin responded with potential consent to the idea of such a mission," presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov has told the media. "But for the time being the OSCE has no understanding of how such a mission can be formed, where it is to be deployed and so on."

"In general there have been no talks on the issue and there could not have been any, because it is a very specific discussion depending on a variety of circumstances," Peskov said. "All (four leaders of the Normandy Quartet) agreed with the idea of creating such a mission, if need be," Peskov added. "But it does not have a specific content yet."

After talks in Berlin on October 20 Putin told the media that the Normandy Quartet was prepared to expand the OSCE mission in Ukraine.

"A great deal of attention was paid to security issues. Consent was achieved on a number of steps to be taken in the near future for the sake of further settling issues related to the disengagement of conflicting parties," Putin said, adding that the leaders had agreed to go ahead with the selection of points and places where such work might proceed. Putin said that "at two places the disengagement has already taken place."

"We’ve confirmed that we are prepared for an expansion of the OSCE mission in the disengagement zone and at the sites where heavy armaments will be kept in store," Putin said. "We’ve confirmed that we will push ahead with efforts along the political track for various purposes, including the final agreements on the rules of implementation of the special status in certain districts of the Lugansk and Donetsk Regions, the Lugansk People’s Republic and the Donetsk People’s Republic."

Normandy Four meeting in Berlin 

According to Peskov, talks between the Normandy Four leaders in Berlin were constructive, with no one speaking hard words.

"No hard words were uttered. Naturally, it was not an easy conversation but it was rather constructive and substantive," he told journalists.

He refuted media allegations that Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko had demanded Russian President Vladimir Putin "stop shooting" in Donbass.