Klimkin: Elections in the Donbas are a 'distant prospect'
Holding elections in the Donbas is a distanct prospect, as stated by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Pavlo Klimkin, to the Verkhovna Rada during an hour of questions to the government on Friday, October 21.
"As of today, we are very far from being able to move to the question of organizing elections since it is necessary to achieve all the required security needs. And the accomplishment of these conditions will be assessed both by us and the OSCE, in particular, by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR)," Klimkin said.
He also noted that the position of Ukraine, Germany and France is dramatically at odds with that of the Russian Federation on the sequence of events in the implementation of the Minsk Agreements.
"Today our position, which is a joint stance with Germany and France, and Russia's position are extremely different from one another, both in terms of the sequence of events and in terms of a clear guarantee of their fulfillment, as well as in terms of the OSCE’s right to access the occupied Donbas and the uncontrolled areas along the Ukrainian-Russian border," the Minister said.
According to Klimkin, Ukraine's position has been consistent in its demand that the security conditions in the region should be fulfilled first, and only then will it be possible to move on to the implementation of the political part of the agreements.
Earlier this week, the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, after a meeting with the leaders of the Normandy format countries in Berlin, said that local elections in the Donbas can be held only after the security conditions are fulfilled. According to him, all foreign troops must be withdrawn from the separatists-controlled areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.