Russia urges ‘immediate ceasefire’ in Ukraine
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said the talks on Ukraine crisis taking place in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, should seek an immediate ceasefire in the conflict.
The statement came ahead of the Ukraine “contact group” talks that includes representatives from Russia, Ukraine, the Vienna-based OSCE security and rights organisation and separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine.
Lavrov said that the Ukrainian forces must pull back from positions from which they can hit civilian targets.
“They must leave positions from which they can harm the civilian population,” Lavrov told students in Moscow.
“I very much count on today’s negotiations being devoted above all to the task of agreeing an immediate ceasefire, without conditions.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin raised the stakes in the conflict on Sunday by calling for the first time for statehood to be discussed for the restive east of the former Soviet state.
“We need to immediately begin substantive talks… on questions of the political organisation of society and statehood in southeastern Ukraine,” the Russian leader said in an interview with Channel 1 state television.
However, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said there was no new endorsement from Moscow for rebel independence. Asked if “New Russia”, a term pro-Moscow rebels use for their territory, should still be part of Ukraine, Peskov said: “Of course.”
“Only Ukraine can reach an agreement with New Russia, taking into account the interests of New Russia, and this is the only way to reach a political settlement,” he added.
Moscow has previously only called for “federalisation” that would grant greater rights to the eastern regions of Ukraine, where predominantly Russian speakers live.
Kyiv to shun rebels
Russia has long called for Kyiv to hold direct political talks with the rebels. Kyiv says it is willing to have talks on more rights for the south and east, but will not talk directly to armed fighters it describes as “international terrorists” and Russian puppets that can only be reined in by Moscow.
Past talks by the “contact group” have covered technical issues such as access to the crash site of a Malaysian airliner shot down in July, but not political questions.
The past week has seen Ukrainian forces flee in the path of a new rebel advance, drawing concern from Ukraine’s Western allies, who say armoured columns of Russian troops came to the aid of a rebellion that would otherwise have been near collapse.
Meanwhile, the EU leaders agreed on Saturday to draw up new economic sanctions against Moscow. The US and EU have gradually tightened economic sanctions against Russia, first imposed after Moscow annexed Crimea following the ousting of Kyiv’s pro-Russian president by protesters in Febrauary.
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