By Vestnik Kavkaza
Yesterday the Russian Ministry for Foreign Affairs stated the need to follow all the provisions of the complex of measures for following the Minsk Agreements, which was adopted on February 12 in Minsk by the Contact Group on Ukraine and supported by the heads of Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine. The Russian Foreign Ministry supports the Donbas militants’ intention to withdraw heavy armaments and to form a security zone, according to the mentioned document.
The Minsk Agreements of February 12 urged the Special Monitoring Mission of the OSCE and the United Center for Coordination and Control to intensify their work, to encourage following of the agreements, and to monitor withdrawal of heavy armaments.
However, Russian diplomats regret that the Special Monitoring Mission of the OSCE in Ukraine doesn’t want to fulfil its functions and avoids monitoring of the process of following the agreements by the conflicting sides, even though the OSCE mission is well aware about the plan for withdrawal of heavy armaments.
Meanwhile, the speaker of the upper house of the Russian parliament, Valentina Matviyenko, thinks that “the four presidents of the four states in the Normandy Quartet did a very important job. This format was effective and useful. Better, worse, barely, but still the Minsk agreements are being implemented. The main thing is that hostilities have stopped, people are not dying anymore, there is withdrawal of heavy equipment - at least, the militia said so and continue to say so. We hope that the Ukrainian authorities will fulfil the provisions prescribed in the Minsk agreement too, and that the OSCE will clearly carry out its mission as observers, but not only in the presidential format.”
According to Matviyenko, for a successful resolution of Ukraine's internal crisis, all forms are good and we cannot underestimate the importance of parliamentary diplomacy: “I am an ardent supporter of such contacts, not only at the bilateral level, but also at the multilateral level. Now the question is how the Bundestag and the Bundesrat of Germany and the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine will react to this proposal. Russia is ready to participate in such a parliamentary format, we will facilitate its implementation. Therefore, it is too early to speak, it is just an idea, let’s work on its implementation. Good, if it happens. Then our parliamentary involvement would be appropriate in the common efforts of the international community for a peaceful settlement of the crisis in Ukraine.”
