Ukraine shows OSCE Russian passports of Donbas representatives in TCG

Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the International Organizations in Vienna Yevhenii Tsymbaliuk said this in a comment to an Ukrinform correspondent.

"During today's online meeting of the Permanent Council, we drew the attention of foreign delegations to Russia's attempts at the talks in Minsk not only to absolve itself of responsibility as a party to the conflict in eastern Ukraine but also to impose the participation in TCG meetings of people who do not represent the population of the temporarily occupied territories of Donbas and in general are citizens of the Russian Federation," he said.

According to the ambassador, during the meeting he showed copies of foreign and domestic passports of the Russian Federation, which belong to Vladislav Deinego and Natalia Nikanorova - the so-called "foreign ministers" of the so-called "LPR" and "DPR" respectively, whose participation in the Minsk talks is being promoted by Russia on behalf of ORDLO.

In addition, participants in a meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council were also shown a Russian passport of so-called "DPR head" Denys Pushylin, the head of the Russian occupation administration in the occupied Donetsk region.

"During the meeting, the Ukrainian delegation stressed that these representatives of the temporarily occupied areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, invited by the Russian side to participate in the TCG, do not represent local residents. The latter can be represented only by local authorities elected in legitimate local elections. Russia has invited to Minsk the people with Russian passports who were brought to power not through democratic and fair elections but with the help of Russian arms and mercenaries," Tsymbaliuk said.

He said that the Minsk package of measures provides for consultations with ORDLO representatives as part of the TCG and Ukraine is working in this area. At the same time, such consultations should be attended by local residents of ORDLO who do not represent the Russian occupation authorities and do not have Russian passports.

Tsymbaliuk also recalled at the meeting that the composition of the Trilateral Contact Group is clearly defined in the first sentence of the Minsk Protocol, which reads as follows: "Upon consideration and discussion of the proposals put forward by the participants of the consultations in Minsk on 1 September 2014, the Trilateral Contact Group, consisting of representatives of Ukraine, the Russian Federation and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), reached an understanding with respect to the need to implement the following steps:

"We asked all delegations of OSCE participating states to remember this every time the Russian delegation tries to promote its distorted vision of the composition of the TCG. There are only three participants in the Trilateral Contact Group: Ukraine, Russia and the OSCE," Tsymbaliuk said.

Photo credit: Yevhenii Tsymbaliuk