UNITED NATIONS, September 22. /TASS/. Russia hopes for a constructive dialogue on its initiative to deploy a UN Mission for the protection of OSCE observers in Donbass, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Thursday at the 72nd session of the United Nations General Assembly.
"We hope that the Russian proposal will facilitate the settlement of the internal Ukrainian crisis," he said. "We are looking forward to constructive interaction on those issues with our European and US partners, without zero-sum games."
"Despite the efforts being undertaken in the Normandy format and the Contact Group, Kyev invents more and more tricks to bog down the implementation of its obligations on implementing the Minsk Package of Measures of 12 February 2015, endorsed by the UN Security Council," Lavrov said.
According to the Russian top diplomat, even under those circumstances Russia is aiming at constructive work and the search for mutually acceptable ways to implement the Minsk agreements.
On September 5, Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested deploying UN peacekeepers in southeastern Ukraine to protect members of the OSCE monitoring mission. The deployment of the UN forces will be possible only after the weapons are withdrawn and upon consent from the self-proclaimed Donbass republics. On September 11, in a telephone conversation with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Putin agreed it might be possible to deploy UN staff in other places as well.
The Russian resolution is currently under consideration at the UN Security Council. Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya told TASS on Sunday that after the first discussion of the document, the Ukrainian and US delegations said they were not ready to work on it. At the same time, Ukraine is likely to submit its own draft resolution on the deployment of UN forces in Donbass.