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Lavrov says Kiev’s ‘party of war’ wants to bury Minsk deal

The Russian top diplomat stresses supporters of a military solution to the Donbass conflict derail the Minsk accords

© Alexander Shcherbak/TASS

MOSCOW, January 24. /TASS/. Supporters of a military solution to the Donbass conflict attempt to derail the Minsk accords, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday

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Ukraine's president denies Donbass reintegration law contradicts Minsk accords

In his address to the 26th International Educational Christmas Readings titled ‘Moral Values and Future of Humanity,’ Lavrov pointed out that the intra-Ukrainian crisis should be solved only via a full and consistent implementation of the Minsk peace deal approved by the United Nations Security Council.

"The only stumbling block on the way is Kiev’s ‘party of war’ that wants to bury the Minsk accords and panders to extremists while imposing a blockade on Donbass and passing a bill at the Verkhovna Rada [parliament] which whitewashes a military solution to the intra-Ukrainian conflict," he said.

Donbass reintegration law

On January 18, the Verkhovna Rada passed a bill dubbed "On the special aspects of state policy aimed at ensuring Ukraine’s state sovereignty over the temporarily occupied areas of the Donetsk and Lugansk Regions," which had been submitted by President Pyotr Poroshenko and is known as the Donbass reintegration bill. The document labels the areas not controlled by Kiev as "temporarily occupied" and empowers the president with the right to use armed forces inside the country without the Rada’s consent. It also stipulates setting up joint operation headquarters of the Ukrainian armed forces to control all military units and military-civil administration in the conflict zone. In addition, all references to the Minsk Agreements have been removed from the document.

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