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Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
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| Information | | |
Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
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26Jun14
Next round of consultations on south-east Ukraine crisis may be held June 27
The next round of consultations on the normalization of the situation in the south-east of Ukraine may be held on June 27, former President Leonid Kuchma said.
"Tomorrow [June 27] we are going to continue this [process]," he told journalists on Thursday, June 26, but did not say where the talks might take place.
On June 23, consultations were held in Donetsk between representatives of the Ukrainian authorities and the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR).
Participating in the talks were Kuchma, the OSCE Secretary-General's special representative Heidi Tagliavini, Ukrainian Choice leader Viktor Medvedchuk, DNR leader Alexander Borodai, South-East Movement leader Oleg Tsarev, and LNR officials.
Russian Ambassador in Kiev Mikhail Zurabov attended the consultations as well.
However, Borodai said later that these were informal preliminary consultations but no talks were being considered.
"There is no question of talks for two reasons: full-fledged negotiations as such can be possible only after Kiev has met seven conditions put forth by Oleg Tsarev, co-chair of the Novorossiya [New Russia] People's Front. These conditions are our common position. The second reason is that the officials who came to Donetsk today had no official powers and status," he said.
At the same time, Borodai said "at least some dialogue has been started by Kiev which for several months preferred to speak in the language of heavy artillery".
He said further discussions, even in the format of informal consultations, could be possible only if Kiev ceased fire and stopped the redeployment of its army and National Guard which threaten the Donbass militia.
Tsarev's conditions include withdrawal of the Ukrainian troops from the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics, payment by Kiev of compensation to the people affected by the conflict, coordination by the Ukrainian president and the republics' parliaments of a constitutional act that would determine their status, and amnesty for the militiamen and political prisoners.
[Source: Itar Tass, Kiev, 26Jun14]
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