MOSCOW, May 05 /ITAR-TASS/. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin urged the Ukrainian sides to begin negotiations but said this would depend on the Kiev authorities’ readiness to do so.

“We would like both sides - the Kiev authorities and representatives of Ukrainian regions, representatives of those who are wishing constitutional reform - to sit down at the negotiating table and discuss the future system of Ukraine. For format is a separate question,” he said on Monday, May 5.

“It is important, though, that both sides participate,” he said.

Karasin believes this dialogue is necessary. “How much the Kiev authorities are prepared for this remains a question,” he added.

The Foreign Ministry urged the Kiev authorities to stop the bloodshed, pull back the troops and begin negotiations in order to discuss how to resolve the political crisis in the country.

“Punitive actions by Kiev’s law enforcers are causing new casualties among civilians. A humanitarian catastrophe is looming in the blocked cities as there is a shortage of medicines and food supply is becoming unsteady,” the ministry said.

Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Yevgeny Perebeinos said earlier in the day that Kiev welcomed the initiative to hold a new round of consultations between the parties to the Geneva agreement of April 17. He believes that a new round of consultations, if held, should have the same format as the previous one: Russia, the European Union, the United States, and Ukraine.