“No special talks on the subject of Ukraine’s state debt are planned to be held in Munich. There is actually nothing to discuss here, debts have to be paid back,” Medvedev said.
Medvedev said that Russia strongly disagrees with Kiev’s interpretation of the debt and its restructuring as Kiev is claiming it is a commercial loan.
“I have said this multiple times and I am going to repeat that the loan to Ukraine is not private, it is a state debt, one country’s sovereign debt to another. The status of the state debt has been recognized by the International Monetary Fund. And that’s a medical fact, as they say,” Medvedev added.
Kiev’s proposals for the settlement of its $3-billion debt to Russia sent via Berlin are unacceptable, but Russia is grateful to the German authorities for the initiative, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev told Sputnik.
"The proposals that we recently received from Ukraine via Germany are absolutely unacceptable. First of all, we cannot hold talks because the official status of the debt has not been recognized; second, the conditions proposed by Kiev are worse than those for commercial creditors. Who would put oneself in a loss-making position? At the same time, we are grateful to our German partners for their initiative that testifies to the seriousness of our arguments on this issue," Medvedev said.
Kiev owes Russia $3 billion in Eurobonds. The debt was secured by the government of then-President Viktor Yanukovych in late 2013. Moscow has repeatedly stated that Ukraine's failure to pay back the debt by the December 20 deadline should be classified as a default.
Moscow disagrees with Kiev's stance that the bond is part of an external commercial debt, arguing that the bond is a sovereign loan provided by one country to another.
Read the full version of the interview here.