DONETSK, February 3. /TASS/. The Ukrainian establishment lives in its "own fictional reality" without laws or rules, Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) Foreign Minister and Permanent Representative to the Minsk talks Natalya Nikonorova said Thursday, commenting on remarks made by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba regarding the special status of Donbass.
"The Ukrainian authorities continue to live in their fictional reality, where there are no objective laws and rules, but everything complies with the principle of ‘it will be the way we say.’ Mr. Kuleba should have understood long ago that their desires or lack thereof, their opinions, positions, and other whims mean absolutely nothing if they are not discussed and negotiated with the other conflicting side - the [Donbass] republics," she said in an interview for the Donetsk News Agency.
According to Nikonorova, the necessity to negotiate both the Donbass special status aspects, including the corresponding amendments to the Ukrainian Constitution, and all matters of Donbass’ future without exception is cemented in both the Package of Measures on the implementation of the Minsk Agreements and in the Normandy Four 2019 summit communique.
"It is precisely the requirements of these documents that are ‘set in stone,’ and all remarks by Ukrainian representatives, where they attempt to interpret the obligations they have undertaken in their own manner, do not make an ounce of sense," the foreign minister said.
She noted that "Kiev’s do-it-yourself approaches run counter to the letter and the spirit of the Minsk Agreements, and thus mean not the implementation, but the sabotage of their obligations by Ukraine."
On Wednesday, Kuleba ruled out granting any special status or veto power to Donbass in his interview with Poland’s Rzeczpospolita. He claimed that no region of Ukraine will have the power of veto for a nationwide state decision, because this is ‘set in stone,’ adding that Donbass will have "no special status, as Russia imagines it, and no veto power.".