PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMCHATSKY, December 25. /TASS/. Return to the logic of national unity is crucial for the Ukrainians, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the Evening with Vladimir Solovyev talk show on the Rossiya 1 TV channel on Thursday.
“The resumed Minsk process stipulates not only a ceasefire agreement, not only a withdrawal of heavy weapons, not only solving of the acutest humanitarian problems in the south-east but also restoration of destroyed infrastructure in Donbas along with, if you will, of services disrupted after President Petro Poroshenko had signed the notorious decree on de facto economic and financial blockade,” Lavrov said.
“The leaders of the self-proclaimed DPR and LPR (Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics) call for the beginning of a joint talk, for restoration of the common economic and then political space,” he said.
“Alongside, it is of crucial importance beside immediate goals which need solving to alleviate the situation of civilians, to have a prospect in the foreseeable future to start talks about the economy and to restore energy ties, trade ties and social benefits,” the minister said.
“DPR and LPR are willing to stay in the shadow of hryvnia but they are being pushed out of there,” Lavrov said. “If the people are united and if the Ukrainian authorities regard the territory as their own and we support it, then why are they trying to force a huge part of its population out of their economic and political space?” Lavrov asked rhetorically.