The West is convinced the Russia has unlimited influence on the leadership of the self-proclaimed Lugansk and Donetsk republics and thus Russia will bear all the responsibility for their refusal to hold local elections on October 25, the day the rest of Ukraine goes to the polls, according to Russia’s daily newspaper Kommersant.
The self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Lugansk decided to hold separate elections on October 18 and November 1, when they will pick their mayors and district governors, respectively.
“If the representatives of Donetsk and Lugansk continue pressing their point and the elections in Donbass take place on a different day than in the rest of Ukraine, don’t comply with the Ukrainian laws and aren't monitored by international observers, it will be a serious – and demonstrative – blow to the Minsk accords,” the newspaper quotes one of the diplomats as saying.
“In fact, it will be the last 'nail in the coffin' of the peaceful agreements. Nobody in Europe or the US believes that Russia can’t influence the 'separatists' for them to turn off this dangerous road,” another diplomat told the newspaper.
A high-ranking official in the Kremlin, quoted by the newspaper, named all the attempts of the western diplomats to link Moscow’s responsibility to the local elections in the self-proclaimed republics a “shell game”.
“They are implementing the Minsk accords extremely loosely,” he said. “It is complete stupidity to accuse us of not fulfilling them. Is the word “Moscow” used in these agreements at least once? Not a single time. Thus, we don't owe anything.”
