Minsk Deal Working, Violence Decreases in East Ukraine – US Congressman
COLUMBIA (Sputnik) – The Minsk accords on the Ukrainian reconciliation are working as the violence in east Ukraine has decreased, US Congressman Joe Wilson told Sputnik on the sidelines of the Kemp Forum on Expanding Opportunity in South Carolina.
“Apparently, there’s been a reduction in violence,” Wilson said, when asked if he thinks that the Minsk agreement is working.
“I have been to Kyiv this year, and I was very happy to see a very positive country being developed that. It should be a unified country. I would want a unification,” Wilson added. ”
Southeastern Ukraine has been suffering from a crisis triggered by a military confrontation between Kyiv authorities and local militias that began in April 2014. The latter have refused to recognize the new Kyiv government imposed by what they consider to be a coup earlier in 2014.
In February, the representatives of the central government in Kyiv and Donbas militias signed a deal on Ukrainian reconciliation in the Belarusian capital of Minsk. Key points of the deal envisage a ceasefire, a weapons pullout from the line of contact between Kyiv forces and militia, the implementation of constitutional reforms, including a decentralization of power in the country, and the granting of special status to the eastern Donbas region.