DPR, LPR Call on Merkel and Hollande to Stop Kiev Flouting Minsk Agreement

DONETSK (Sputnik) — The heads of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR) on Saturday called on French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel to demand that Kiev stops ignoring Minsk agreements and returns to the peace process.

In mid-February, during a Normandy Format meeting in the Belarusian capital Minsk, the leaders of Russia, France, Germany and Ukraine hammered out a deal aimed at ending the military conflict between Kiev forces and eastern Ukrainian militia.

The initiative included a ceasefire, the withdrawal of heavy arms from the line of contact in Donbass, certain amendments to Ukrainian constitution and defining the modalities of full restoration of social and economic connections in the country, including the payment of pensions and other social benefits.

“We call on you, the representatives of the guarantor countries, not just to influence and prompt the Ukrainian authorities to comply with the complex of measures and restore social benefits to the people of Donbass, but to firmly demand that the Ukrainian side stops ignoring the Minsk agreements and returns to the peaceful results of the negotiations process,” DPR and LPR leaders said in a joint statement published by Donetsk news agency.

Kiev stopped paying social benefits to the people of Donbas in July, 2014. In following November, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed a decree, stipulating that in order to receive their pensions the people of Donetsk and Luhansk breakaway regions must register at the territories controlled by Ukraine’s forces.

Some 15,000 pensioners residing in LPR and DPR filed a lawsuit demanding that Kiev pays the money it owes them.

On Thursday, Kiev Court of Appeal ruled that the halting of social benefits in Donbass was illegal. However, Ukraine’s Minister of Finance Pavlo Petrenko said he will appeal this decision in the Supreme Administrative Court.