MOSCOW, August 29 (RIA Novosti) - The armed conflict in eastern Ukraine can only be stopped by peacekeeping forces, but neither the West nor Kiev are interested in doing so, a member of the Russian Senate Committee on Defense and Security, Valery Shnyakin, told RIA Novosti Friday.
“Peace in southeastern Ukraine is impossible without a peacekeeping contingent entering; the units [fighting each other] must be separated. This issue cannot be resolved by peaceful, diplomatic means,” Shnyakin said.
The senator, however, stressed that Kiev authorities “Do not make their own decisions,” while Washington and Brussels “Are not interested in ending the military conflict…This is why bringing in the peacekeepers [to Ukraine] is not yet possible,” the official concluded.
Earlier on Friday, Nikolay Bordyuzha, the secretary general of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) a military alliance that includes Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, claimed the bloc’s peacekeeping forces are ready for any kind of operation, including deployment to Ukraine. The Council of Collective Security, which consists of CTSO member counties’ presidents, has the right to approve this kind of operation, Bordyuzha added.
In mid-April, Kiev launched a special military operation against pro-independence forces in eastern Ukraine. According to the latest UN estimates, at least 2,220 were killed and almost 6,000 injured since the fighting began in mid-April.
