DONETSK/LUHANSK, December 8. /TASS/. The Donetsk and Luhansk republics have asked Russia not to supply coal to Ukraine to make Kiev buy it from Donbass.
“Miners and all the people of Donbass address miners and the government of Russia — do not supply Ukraine with coal of the kinds that Donbass has and Ukraine bought from us before the spring. It is necessary to force Kiev to lift the economic blockade, buy coal from our mines and pay for our work. Otherwise, hundreds of enterprises and millions of people will be doomed to be ruined and to hunger,” the chairmen of the people’s assemblies of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics said in a statement on Monday.
Under the presidential decree of November 15, the Ukrainian government must stop operation of state companies and organizations in some territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions and organize evacuation of workers, property and documents from there. Special regulations must be imposed for energy supply to Donbass, and a draft law must be submitted to the parliament within a month to change Budget Code regulations for mutual payments between Ukraine’s state budget and local budgets.
Leaders of the Lugansk and Donetsk republics have described the decree of President Pyotr Poroshenko as genocide and an act aimed at ruining the regions.