MOSCOW, January 31. /TASS/. The Kremlin is certain that it is necessary to step up pressure on Kiev to persuade it to eventually comply with the Minsk agreements.
"Of course, Moscow, Paris and Berlin need to strengthen their influence and pressure on Kiev to force Ukraine to implement the provisions, which are enshrined in the relevant documents," Russian Presidential Spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters on Tuesday.
The Kremlin does not link the aggravation of the situation in the Donbass region with the transitional period in the US administration, Peskov has noted.
"I don’t think [that this is related to the change of the US administration] but, undoubtedly, such aggressive manifestations are being organized by the Ukrainian leadership for some purpose," Peskov said.
"To all appearances, some attempt is under way to drive attention from something else," the Kremlin spokesman said.
Poroshenko's unwillingness to implement the deal
Monday’s attack on the Donbass militia shows Ukrainian president’s incapability to implement the Minsk agreements, Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
"Such aggressive actions of the Ukrainian military forces are disrupting the implementation of the Minsk agreements," Peksov said. "Of course, from our point of view, they prove that the Ukrainian authorities, Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko in particular is unwilling to fulfill these agreements. Moreover, it looks like by undertaking these aggressive steps they are trying to divert attention from a very precarious domestic situation (in Ukraine)."
"In any case, all this is disrupting the Minsk agreements and significantly complicates the situation, so we would like to reiterate our concern," the Kremlin spokesman added.
Peskov also said that Moscow had reliable information proving that "yesterday, not the Ukrainian military units but some volunteer nationalist battalions tried to attack the territory controlled by the Donbass republics." "They (these battalions) crossed the line of contact with artillery support, so the Donbass militia had to fight back in the Avdeyevka area to retake their territory," the Russian presidential spokesman said. "This attack was repulsed."
"In this case, experts should assess specific data. We have this information but I can’t judge since I am not a military expert," Peskov said when asked what was the source of the Kremlin’s information on who had triggered the deterioration in the situation in Donbass.
"We very much regret that this attack on the Donbass militia caused casualties to both sides," he stressed.