Russian Federation Permanent Representative A.K. LUKASHEVICH to OSCE Permanent Council
February 10, 2022
On the deteriorating situation in Ukraine
and continued non-compliance
Ukrainian authorities of the Minsk agreements
Dear Madam President,
In recent days, we have seen a certain change in rhetoric in those countries where until recently the world was threatened with the threat of an “imminent attack” on Ukraine. Some media, such as the Bloomberg agency, managed to release fake news about the “invasion” that had already begun in the information field last Friday. Then removed. Adjusted the tone and US officials. The other day, the head of European diplomacy, J. Borrell, also said that he did not believe in a “Russian invasion” of Ukraine.
Let’s remember the zeal with which, not so long ago, representatives of a number of Western countries sought to convince everyone of the opposite. Even in this room. The terms were named: in November, in December, in January and so on. As the facts show, all these “horror stories” turned out to be nothing more than propaganda “zilch”, empty chatter.
Now let’s turn to the real situation in Ukraine. A protracted armed civil conflict continues in the country, caused and fueled by the aggressive and unceremonious interference of the West in the development of the Ukrainian state and society. In February, Ukraine will mark the eighth anniversary of the bloody 2014 armed coup d’état organized with foreign support. The coup that raised the most radical nationalist parties and movements to the firmament of Ukrainian politics, which began to aggressively impose ideas of militant nationalism and Russophobia alien to the majority of the population – all this under the guise of alleged patriotism. The uncontrolled circulation of weapons among nationalists and neo-Nazis, their desire to impose their own rules throughout the country led to a logical result: many Ukrainians opposed the artificial division of society and against the self-proclaimed authorities, who acted in conjunction with the nationalists. At that time, in the south-east of Ukraine, people began to organize themselves into people’s squads to protect their homes and a peaceful way of life from the encroachments of nationalists.
The refusal of the “Maidan” authorities from a civilized and respectful dialogue with the inhabitants of their own country led to an armed confrontation. A military operation was launched to suppress dissent. Even after signing the Minsk agreements under international control, the then leadership of Ukraine continued military planning for a “direct dialogue with the Donbass.” Dialogue with the help of artillery and mortars – in the form of shelling, casualties, destruction.
In choosing such tactics, the Ukrainian authorities were and are not independent. The notorious “external management” under which the country has fallen in recent years, saying goodbye to the remnants of state sovereignty, leaves its mark. There is no doubt that without the destructive impact from abroad, Ukrainians would be much faster able to find a common language and achieve peace among themselves. On both sides of the line of contact, relatives and friends of each other live who have fallen into the “millstones” of new political watersheds artificially imposed on the country – dividing lines introduced by geopolitical strategists from the West and other demagogues who generously distributed cookies and no less sweet ones on the “Maidan”, but empty promises.
In the midst of armed civil confrontation, instead of promoting an inclusive national dialogue for peace based on the Minsk “Package of Measures”, foreign patrons of the post-Maidan authorities decided to invest in the militarization of Ukraine. They began to send there not political signals about the need to fulfill “Minsk”, but military appropriations, equipment and weapons, shells and cartridges, with which some citizens of Ukraine continue to kill other citizens of Ukraine to this day. In a word, they began to push “hot heads” in every way to a military solution to the “Donbass problem” in the conditions of sabotage of the Minsk agreements.
Take a look at the numbers from the beginning of this year alone: at least twelve aircraft each from the US and the UK, two from Canada and one from Poland arrived in Ukraine, all carrying weapons and other military supplies. The United States alone sent about 700 tons of cargo. Immediately upon the arrival of these cargoes, the United States and Great Britain, using their so-called. “instructors” began training the Ukrainian military on the combat use of the delivered missile systems, grenade launchers and other weapons in urban areas. Specific plans to send at least 100 additional troops from the British Special Forces and 200 people from the Canadian Special Operations Forces have long been no secret. If the authorities in Kiev claim that they are not preparing offensive actions or armed provocations, what is all this for? By the way, Since the beginning of the year, the SMM has already counted over 8,000 ceasefire violations in Donbas. Will there be fewer of them after such military preparations?
Eight years later, the problems in Ukraine are the same as in 2014. Radical nationalists from illegal armed groups have not been disarmed. For example, the same “Right Sector”. They continue their attempts – with the support of the current authorities – to restore their order in the east of Ukraine with “fire and sword”. Their plans do not include the observance of the ceasefire or the implementation of the Minsk agreements. The authorities, in turn, cannot or do not want to do anything about this, acting, in fact, at the same time with them.
Let us recall how, in November 2019, representatives of the nationalist battalions did not allow President V. Zelensky to disengage forces and hardware in Zolote, they did not want to leave this disengagement area with weapons. Under their pressure and at the American “prompt”, V. Zelensky at the “Norman” summit in Paris on December 9, 2019 refused to approve the plan already agreed by experts and adopted by Donetsk and Lugansk on the disengagement of forces and hardware along the entire line of contact. Having agreed in the minutes of the meeting of the Contact Group on March 11, 2020, to have a direct dialogue with the authorized representatives of certain areas of Donbass, Kiev then actually disavowed the signature under the agreements on the establishment of the Consultative Council.
It is also not surprising that the meetings of the Contact Group and its working subgroups held on February 8-9 again ended without results. They reaffirmed that Kiev does not intend to conduct a direct dialogue with Donetsk and Luhansk. On February 3, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine D. Kuleba said on the air of one of the Ukrainian TV channels that the Minsk agreements “cannot be implemented on Russian terms, which are based on a direct dialogue between Ukraine and ORDLO, which is being imposed on us.” A day earlier, he said that Donbass would not receive any special status. With these instructions, as he stressed, the representative of Ukraine will also go to today’s meeting of foreign policy advisers to the leaders of the Normandy Four in Berlin. Should we expect progress on it?
It is worth emphasizing that the need to implement the provisions of “Minsk” in consultations and in agreement with representatives of certain areas of Donbass is not some kind of “Russian conditions”, but a direct prescription of the Minsk “Package of Measures”. Once again, we draw attention to the statement of the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine A. Danilov in an interview with The Associated Press: he directly said that Kiev did not intend and is not going to implement the Minsk agreements, since their implementation “would mean the destruction of the country” .
Thus, the Ukrainian authorities, without encountering any criticism from foreign patrons, are trying to send a false signal to the Ukrainian society that the Minsk agreements are destructive in their essence, and their implementation will mean almost “surrender”.
Against this background, it is worth paying attention to what militant Ukrainian national radicals are saying today. Listen to the words of E. Karas, the leader of the infamous C14 movement – on February 5 in Kiev, at the nationalist forum Bandera Readings, he said: “We have now been given so many weapons, not because we are good, but because we are the only who is ready to carry out the tasks of the West. Because we have fun, it’s fun for us to kill and it’s fun to fight. Arguments about how “fun and cool” it is to fight with one’s own people do not find any proper legal assessment by the law enforcement agencies of Ukraine, neither politically by the country’s leadership, nor internationally, for example, within the framework of the OSCE.
New paramilitary nationalist groups continue to emerge, with the creation of a so-called “closed guerrilla network” called Honor of the Nation earlier this year, which now has about a thousand members. On February 6, under the instruction of the nationalists from the Aidar battalion, who had been in the Donbass, the members of this association, with weapons in their hands, conducted combat training exercises.
Mr Chairman,
These days, the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Polish Foreign Minister Z. Rau is visiting Ukraine, he will also visit the areas of Donbass controlled by Kiev. We regret that Z. Rau did not respond to the invitation of the representatives of Donetsk and Luhansk in the Contact Group and did not find an opportunity to get acquainted with the real state of affairs on the other side of the line of contact.
Once again, we call on the foreign curators of the current Kiev regime to refrain from fostering the ideas of aggressive nationalism in Ukraine, to stop the destabilizing militarization of this country. It should be understood that the full implementation of the Minsk “Package of Measures” of February 12, 2015, approved by UN Security Council Resolution 2202, is the only way to peacefully, politically and diplomatically resolve the conflict. The implementation of the provisions of “Minsk” in their entirety, consistency and interconnection will not be a “surrender”, but a tool for ending the armed confrontation in the east of Ukraine, achieving sustainable peace and national reconciliation, as well as restoring territorial integrity.
In particular, we remind those member states of the UN Security Council that, on February 17, 2015, joined the unanimous support of the “Package of Measures”, which implies a direct dialogue between Kiev and Donetsk and Lugansk.
Thank you for attention
Free Ukraine Now 