On the eve of the elections in Donbass, Russia and the West argue about the secret part of the Minsk agreements
Moscow - Kyiv, October 31 (PolitNavigator, Mikhail Stamm) - Moscow and the West are arguing over the legitimacy of local elections scheduled for November 2 in the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics. Interlocutors “Kommersant” Russian government agencies and the leadership of the DPR claim that holding the vote on this very day corresponds to the secret eight-page annex to the Minsk memorandum of September 19. Kiev and the OSCE have not confirmed the existence of such a document. The EU also said that they were not aware of this application, and repeated the threat to tighten sanctions against the Russian Federation if it recognizes the elections in Donbass.
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The leadership of the EU, the USA and the UN have already declared the illegitimacy of the vote scheduled for November 2.
However, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry assured that Moscow recognizes its results: “In accordance with the Minsk agreements reached between representatives of the President of Ukraine and the militias with the participation of representatives of the Russian Federation and the OSCE, the holding of elections in Donbass was agreed upon from October 19 to November 3.” .
Neither the Minsk Protocol of September 5, nor the subsequent memorandum of September 19 says anything about possible dates for holding elections. But according to three sources in the government agencies of the Russian Federation, an eight-page secret addition was attached to the memorandum, endorsed by representatives of all parties participating in the negotiations. It fixes the interval in which local elections should take place in Donbass. “November 2 hits it, but December 7 doesn’t. In Kyiv they know this very well,” said one of the interlocutors.
DPR Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Purgin says that the secret protocol “on six pages” contained “80% agreed upon” coordinates of the line of separation between the territories of the militias and the Ukrainian security forces. “There are not names of settlements, but coordinates - latitude and longitude,” he explained. “This is part of the memorandum. It was not finalized regarding the coordinates. But even that part for which there were no objections is being violated on the Ukrainian side.”
Representative of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine Andrey Lysenko did not confirm the availability of the application. “If they have these documents, let them show them,” he said. Earlier, sources close to Petro Poroshenko said that there were additional agreements, but only “orally.”
The press service of the OSCE, whose representative Heidi Tagliavini personally participated in the Minsk negotiations, yesterday could not confirm or deny the existence of an unpublished annex to the memorandum dated September 19.
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