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Ukraine reluctant to comply with Minsk accords, says Lugansk envoy

Kiev’s representatives can neither explain nor prove why they do not consider representatives of the Donbass republics to be full-fledged participants in the negotiations, according to the envoy

Envoy of the Lugansk People’s Republic Rodion Miroshnik Natalia Fedosenko/TASS

Envoy of the Lugansk People’s Republic Rodion Miroshnik

© Natalia Fedosenko/TASS

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Kiev eyes retake of Donbass until end of 2020 but drafts plan B

LUGANSK, May 13. /TASS/. Ukraine continues to shy away from the implementation of the Minsk agreements to resolve the conflict in the Donbass region, envoy of the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) to the political subgroup of the Contact Group for eastern Ukrainian settlement, Rodion Miroshnik said on Wednesday commenting on the subgroup’s meeting held on Wednesday.

"Kiev’s new representative in the political working group of the Contact Group came to today's meeting with the position that did not differ substantially from his predecessor’s [stance]," he wrote on his Telegram channel. According to Miroshnik, Kiev’s envoy said at the meeting that Ukraine would not comply with three of the 13 clauses of the Minsk agreements, specifically, the ones on holding elections in Donbass before transferring control over the border with Russia, enshrining the special status of Donbass in Ukraine’s Constitution and on the coordination of laws related to the Minsk accords passed by Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada (parliament) with representatives of the Lugansk and Donetsk people’s republics.

"To make sure that the talks are effective, Kiev needs to change its stance rather than envoys," Miroshnik noted.

Kiev’s representatives can neither explain nor prove why they do not consider representatives of the Donbass republics to be full-fledged participants in the negotiations, he went on to say. Miroshnik stressed that no effective solutions could be found without the LPR and DPR.

"It’s just more convenient for Kiev when the war in Donbass can be presented as an international conflict rather than an internal civil war, with Ukrainians killing Ukrainians," he added.

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