KIEV, July 19 (RIA Novosti) - Ukrainian authorities are preparing international legal claims on the recognition of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk people's republics as terrorist organizations, the press service of the Ukrainian president reported.
At a meeting with Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans, "the president [Petro Poroshenko] said that international legal claims are prepared to globally recognize the so-called DPR [Donetsk People’s Republic] and LPR [Luhansk People’s Republic] as terrorist organizations," the press service said.
On Friday, Poroshenko called the Malaysia Airlines plane crash in Ukraine a terrorist attack.
There were 298 people on board, 85 of them were children, and nobody managed to survive.
Kiev blamed independence supporters in the war-torn Donetsk Region for downing the passenger plane with a surface-to-air missile.
The leader of the Donetsk People’s Republic said local militia did not have the required technology to shoot a target flying as high as 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) in the air. The missile systems that were found in the Ukrainian military unit, which was captured by self-defense forces, were a «scrap pile» unfit to be used and beyond repair, according to independence supporters.
In mid-April, Kiev authorities started a special military operation in the east of Ukraine to suppress pro-independence protests, with most clashes breaking out in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The self-proclaimed people’s republics of Luhansk and Donetsk held referendums on self-determination on May 11, with over 90 percent of voters supporting greater autonomy.
