Russia is ready to return to Ukraine the positions won by the militias
Moscow – Kiev, January 22 (PolitNavigator, Mikhail Stamm) – An agreement on the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the demarcation line, recorded in the annex to the Minsk memorandum of September 19, 2014, under the supervision of the OSCE monitoring mission, became the main outcome of the Berlin meeting of the foreign ministers of the “Normandy Four” – Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France, which ended on the night of January 22, the morning newspaper Vedomosti reports.
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This is recorded in a joint statement, a copy of which is posted on Twitter by the speaker of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, Yevgeny Perebiynis, the newspaper writes.
The fact that Russia agrees to recognize the line of contact that is fixed in the Minsk memorandum, in contrast to the actual situation, which differs in favor of the militias, became known the day before. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov explained that it was precisely this proposal that Russian President Vladimir Putin addressed to his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko last Thursday, but it remained unanswered.
“The patience of all participants is running out,” but “there is tangible progress,” this is how German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier summed up the results of the two-hour meeting in Berlin. “I have the impression that the four foreign ministers gathered here are aware of their responsibility and understand that this cannot continue,” Deutsche Welle quotes him as saying. According to him, the parties managed to agree at least on the criteria by which the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the demarcation line should begin.
This process will be launched in the coming days at a scheduled meeting of the trilateral contact group.
Lavrov described the Berlin meeting as “very useful.”
Russia is ready to return the positions won by the rebels to Ukraine.