MOSCOW (Sputnik) – The Kiev government’s aggressive behavior in eastern Ukraine stalls all reconciliation attempts, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a televised Q&A session Thursday.
“I think this was a colossal mistake, and such moves bring the situation into a deadlock.”
Putin on the situation in Ukraine: By not fulfilling its social obligations, Kiev is cutting #Donbass off from Ukraine #DirectLine
— President of Russia (@KremlinRussia_E) 16 апреля 2015
In April 2014 Kiev launched a military operation in Donbas to suppress local independence supporters who refused to recognize the coup-imposed central government. According to the UN estimates, the conflict claimed over 6,000 lives and displaced more than a million people. It also brought Donbass to the brink of humanitarian catastrophe with people there struggling without basic necessities.
In mid-February, at a Normandy Format meeting in the Belarusian capital, the leaders of Russia, France, Germany and Ukraine elaborated a new Minsk deal, a 13-point plan aimed at facilitating Ukrainian reconciliation process.
The measures included a ceasefire that entered into force on February 15, the pullout of heavy arms from the contact line between Kiev and Donbass militias, an all-for-all prisoner exchange and certain amendments to Ukrainian constitution. At a Normandy Format talks in Berlin in April, the foreign ministers of the participating states confirmed their commitment to the Minsk agreement.
On Tuesday, the head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic Alexander Zakharchenko said that Kiev had moved more than 100 pieces of military equipment closer to the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk.
