MOSCOW, February 2. /TASS/. Member of Russia’s State Duma International Affairs Committee, Sergei Zheleznyak, has described Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko’s plans to hold a referendum on NATO membership as absurd deceit linking this statement to the alliance’s fading interest in the current government in Kiev.
Poroshenko announced his plans to hold a referendum on Kiev’s NATO membership in an interview with Germany’s Berliner Morgenpost newspaper. He also asserted that he wants the anti-Russian sanctions to be lifted "more than anyone else."
"The present Ukrainian government is ready for any scam to show its pro-Western approach to maintain fading interest on the part of NATO hawks discouraged by the incompetent and corrupt Maidan leaders," Zheleznyak told reporters on Thursday. The politician emphasized that the NATO Charter and public statements made by senior officials in the countries determining the alliance’s policy "make all Kiev’s hopes for prospective NATO membership futile."
NATO’s fate became uncertain after Donald Trump assumed office, Zheleznyak went on to say. "That is why Poroshenko’s attempt to imitate democracy during the civil war and total lawlessness by asking citizens whether they want Ukraine to join NATO looks like an absurd deceit," he pointed out.
"As long as the war with the people of Donbass unleashed by Poroshenko continues to rage in southeastern Ukraine, the Minsk agreements are ignored by Kiev and armed Nazis and their sponsors, the oligarchs, are running the show in other regions of Ukraine, no referendums will provide reliable results and can be considered legitimate, as they will not reflect free opinion of all people in that country," he warned.