DONETSK, March 4. /TASS/. The United States should better do something about Kiev’s aggressive actions and violations of the Minsk agreements rather than think about "disbanding" the self-proclaimed republics of Donbass, Denis Pushilin, who leads a delegation of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) to the peace talks in Minsk, said on Sunday, commenting on pronouncements by US Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations Kurt Volker.
"If Mr. Volker really wants a peace resolution to the conflict, he should better focus attention on his advisees, on Ukraine, on Kiev’s systemic violations of its liabilities under the Minsk agreements. It would be much more paying," the Donetsk News Agency quoted him as saying.
Volker said at a Hudson Institute seminar on March 2 that the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR) "must be disbanded" as "there is no place for them in the Ukrainian constitutional order."
Under the Minsk agreements, certain areas of the Lugansk and Donetsk regions are to be granted a special status within Ukraine, which is to be committed to paper in the country’s constitution. The Minsk agreements also envisage that Kiev agree with these areas a law on local elections after the cessation of hostilities, weapons withdrawal, amnesty and prisoner exchange in the all-for-all format.