The line drawn in the United States in the Ukrainian direction makes it impossible for the United States to participate in the “Normandy format” on the settlement in Donbass, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told RIA Novosti.
Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for the Temporarily Occupied Territories of Ukraine Oleksiy Reznikov said that Kiev is interested in creating additional alliances to end the conflict in Donbass. In particular, he called for the US and Poland to join the talks.
The head of the Kiev delegation to the contact group on Donbass, Leonid Kravchuk, also said that the US presence would strengthen the negotiations in the “Normandy format”, according to him, Kiev is holding consultations on the US participation in the negotiation process, not yet in the public plane.
“With the approaches that Washington is demonstrating and applying, it has nothing to do in the Normandy format,” Ryabkov said, commenting on the possibility of involving the United States in the negotiations.
Google News!Ryabkov told RIA Novosti yesterday that Moscow and Washington had a telephone conversation last week on the situation in Ukraine, while Russia is not yet inclined to conduct additional contacts with Washington on this topic, especially “in the tone” that the Americans are imposing.
The so-called “Normandy format” of negotiations on Ukraine has existed since June 2014. Then, during the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the landing of the Allied troops in Normandy, the leaders of Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France for the first time discussed the settlement of the conflict in Donbass. The previous summit was held in Paris on December 9, 2019. The next meeting was supposed to take place in four months. Recently, the parties at different levels have been discussing the prospects for interaction in this format.
In April 2014, the Ukrainian authorities launched a military operation against the self-proclaimed LPR and DPR, which declared independence after the coup d’etat in Ukraine in February 2014. According to the latest UN data, about 13 thousand people became victims of the conflict. The issue of resolving the situation in Donbass is being discussed, including during the meetings in Minsk of the contact group, which since September 2014 has already adopted three documents regulating steps to de-escalate the conflict. However, even after the armistice agreements between the parties to the conflict, shootings continue.
Discussion about this post