Lavrov urges Ukraine to start broad national dialogue on constitutional reform
GENEVA. April 18 (Interfax) - Partakers in the quadripartite negotiations held in Geneva on Thursday believe that Kyiv should immediately launch a broad national dialogue in the context of the constitutional reform, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated.
"The statement we have adopted today contains a provision, which urges the immediate start of a broad national dialogue in the context of the constitutional reform so that all regions be able to convey their wishes," Lavrov said upon the end of the quadripartite meeting.
"These wishes are already being expressed, and the ball is in the court of the Kyiv authorities which are supposed to provide an inclusive, transparent and responsible constitutional process," he noted.
Lavrov said he had handed over to the European and U.S. partners the documents Russia had obtained from representatives of southeastern Ukraine, including the Party of Regions, the Luhansk Regional Council and the new movement, Southeast.
"These documents give a rather detailed account of the opinion of people from the southern and eastern [Ukraine] about the way the new constitution should address the interests of regions," the minister continued.
The involvement of main Ukrainian opposition forces, which disagreed with what happened in Kyiv on February 22, was suggested in the arrangement of the quadripartite meeting, Lavrov said. "Yet representatives of the opposition, primarily from the south and the east, were not invited here for organizational reasons," the minister said, adding that Russia had presented the aforesaid documents.
