MOSCOW, January 21. /TASS/. The German Foreign Ministry’s press service statement that a ministerial meeting of the “Normandy quartet” is called at the wish of Russia and Ukraine, is an attempt to present the Ukrainian crisis as a Russian-Ukrainian conflict, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.
“The German Foreign Ministry statement that the meeting of foreign ministers of the ‘Normandy quartet’ (comprising Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France) due in Berlin today is called at the wish of Russia and Ukraine does not correspond to reality,” the ministry said. “The meeting was planned as continuation of earlier held negotiations and teleconferences of the ministers in the ‘quartet’ format.”
Moscow thus “has to state with regret that this interpretation regarding the 'initiators' of the Berlin meeting is already not the first attempt to present the Ukrainian crisis as a conflict between Russia and Ukraine and shrug off responsibility for encouraging peaceful settlement of this internal Ukrainian conflict through Kiev’s dialogue with the country’s south-east.”
"The current negotiations of the ministers are aimed at influencing the Ukrainian side, making Kiev realize this indisputable truth and proceed to an inclusive nationwide dialogue for the restoration of peace, calm and stability in the country,” the ministry said. “The immediate cessation of hostilities and bloodshed and the launch of the long needed constitutional reform are the essential conditions for this.”
The first meeting between the leaders of Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine took place in June 2014 in Normandy, which gave this format its name. Back then, the four leaders only laid a basis for a subsequent political process within the Contact Group on the settlement in eastern Ukraine.