DONETSK, September 09. /ITAR-TASS/. Leaders of the Donetsk and Luhanks People’s Republics are standing firm for self-determination, the Novorossiya news agency quoted Andrei Purgin, the first Deputy Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic as saying on Tuesday.

“We are standing firm on positions of self-determination within the administrative borders of the former Donetsk and Luhansk regions,” he said, commenting on Kiev’s proposals on the regions’ special administrative status that were advanced in line with a protocol adopted by the Contact Group on Ukraine last week.

Earlier on Tuesday, speaker of the Luhank Republic’s legislature, Alexei Karyakin, told ITAR-TASS that the republic’s leaders would thoroughly scrutinize the draft bill on the region’s special status.

“The republic’s leaders think it expedient to thoroughly study the draft law on the region’s special status,” he said. “We can maintain a political dialogue with the Kiev authorities, but only when we make sure their document takes into account the current realities and promotes Luhansk’s socio-economic development in fact, not in word,” he said.