“The first myth is that there are some secret agreements on Minsk [accords] that are still unknown to the public or to our partners. I want to strongly dismiss that. That is an unnatural style of the European diplomacy,” Poroshenko told the Ukrainian television broadcasters in an interview.
“There are also other myths that Minsk [agreements] had exhausted themselves and that there is allegedly another alternative. I point out that today Minsk is the only way to peace,” Poroshenko added.
In April 2014, Kiev authorities launched a military operation against pro-independence militia in Donbas. In February 2015, the two sides reached a ceasefire deal after talks brokered by the leaders of Russia, France, Germany and Ukraine — the so-called Normandy Format — in the Belarusian capital of Minsk.
The deal stipulates a full ceasefire, weapons withdrawal from the line of contact in eastern Ukraine, an all-for-all prisoner exchange and constitutional reforms, which would give a special status to the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics. Both sides of the conflict, however, are constantly accusing each other of violations of the agreement.
