DPR supports Poroshenko's proposal to set specific deadlines for Minsk agreements
DONETSK. Jan 13 (Interfax) - The self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) is ready to accept a proposal to tie specific points of the Minsk agreements to specific dates.
"We are ready to accept all these things, but we understand that changes to the Ukrainian Constitution imply a certain amount of time. First they should implement their clauses, and then we'll see how we implement ours," DPR leader Alexander Zakharchenko told reporters on Wednesday.
He accused Kyiv of failing to implement the Minsk agreements and expressed doubt there will be any result from the Wednesday meeting in Minsk of the Trilateral Contact Group which mediates the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
"The year of 2015 is gone, the year when was supposed to dot all the i's. Judging by the timeline of the events, Ukraine has not only categorically failed to abide by even those clauses that were spelt out in Minsk. Ukraine is now trying to twist everything, first by raising the issue of reaching the border [taking control over the border], but without making the constitutional reform and assigning a special status to Donbas. And most importantly, what it says there is that everything should be agreed on with the leaders of the DPR and LPR [Luhansk People's Republic]. How Poroshenko is going to do this, I don't know. My understanding is that this Minsk [meeting] is yet another fiasco, but we'll see what its results will be," Zakharchenko said.
It was reported that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko called for specific deadlines to be set for the Minsk agreements.
"We stress that all clauses of the Minsk agreements must be implemented, which is why, given that Russia stopped honoring its part of the obligations, we insist that in 2016 all steps envisioned by the Minsk agreements should be tied to a specific date," Poroshenko told reporters on Monday.