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Kremlin reiterates Minsk-2 continues to be roadmap for settlement in Ukraine

Earlier Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called for accelerating the work on the roadmap to resolve the situation in Donbass following talks with German top diplomat

MOSCOW, March 10. /TASS/. The Kremlin insists that Minsk-2 remains the main document to be implemented by the parties.

"Frankly speaking, I have no information about the statements that have been made," Russian Presidential Spokesman, Dmitry Peskov said answering a question from a TASS correspondent on Friday. Olga Aivazovskaya, Kiev’s envoy to the Contact Group’s political subgroup at the Minsk talks, said earlier in the day that the elections and constitutional reform issue had been removed from the Minsk-2 agenda.

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Russian diplomat blames Kiev for disengagement of forces in Donbass faiure

"The Minsk agreements continue to be the only signed text, which is the roadmap within the framework of the intra-Ukrainian settlement. There are no changes here," Peskov emphasized.

Aivazovskaya earlier asserted that the issue of holding elections in the Donbass areas uncontrolled by Kiev has been withdrawn from the agenda thanks to the stance taken by the Ukrainian side. She noted that "the negotiation process is sometimes much more difficult in terms of victory or treason than one would think, because the elections and the constitutional amendments issues have been removed from the agenda, including thanks to the Ukrainian side’s stance."

The political part of the Package of Measures for the Implementation of the Minsk Agreements (Minsk-2) signed by Contact Group members on February 12, 2015, is the basis for resolving the conflict in the Donbass region. In addition to a ceasefire and weapons withdrawal, the document envisages a deep constitutional reform, which should lead to the decentralization of power with due account for the special status of separate districts of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions and elections in that region.

However, the plan has not been implemented to date. Kiev has flatly refused to comply with the political provisions of the agreement saying that security issues continue to be unresolved.

On March 9, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called for accelerating the work on the roadmap to resolve the situation in Donbass following talks with German top diplomat, Sigmar Gabriel. Lavrov noted that, as far as the political process is concerned, Russia is guided by the decisions of the Normandy Four (France, Germany, Ukraine, Russia) leaders, which said that "it is necessary to simultaneously make progress in honoring the security and political commitments.".

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