Ukraine doing everything to agree on 'Easter truce' - TCG member

Ukraine is doing everything possible to introduce a truce in the east of the country during the Easter holidays, as the number of casualties may significantly grow without a ceasefire, according to Tetiana Ivanova, a member of the Ukrainian delegation to the Trilateral Contact Group (TCG).

She said this live on the Dom television channel, according to an Ukrinform correspondent.

"The truce regime is very important now. It is always important because it's about people's lives. But now, on the eve of the holidays, it is very important because there will be a large crowd in the cemeteries," she said.

Ivanova believes that Ukraine will be able to agree on the truce, and the Ukrainian delegation is doing everything possible to make that happen.

"But I don't think that it [the ceasefire] will last for a long time and that there will be no provocations in the future. I don't think that the lives of Ukrainians are no longer in danger," she added.

Earlier, Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to the Ukrainian delegation to the TCG, said that the parties did not agree on the Easter truce during the TCG meeting on April 28 because the final text of the statement had not been approved.

At the same time, the head of the Ukrainian delegation to the TCG, Leonid Kravchuk, said that the Ukrainian delegation to the TCG agrees that the draft agreement on the Easter truce proposed by Russia and control over its observance should be taken as a basis, but with Ukrainian additions.

op