The issue of deploying a UN peacekeeping mission in the Ukrainian eastern region of Donbass should be discussed will all sides involved in the conflict in the country, including with the leadership of the people’s republics of Donetsk (DPR) and Lugansk (LPR), Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday.
On Sunday, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko held a phone conversation with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and suggested the deployment of a UN peacekeeping mission in Donbass.
“It is important to collate the points of view of all interested sides… It is necessary to find out the UN attitude to this initiative — to what extent it is technologically and politically viable and so on. It is important to know the attitude to this idea of all Normandy format sides,” Peskov said, adding that both the authorities in Kiev and LPR and DPR should be involved in discussion of this issue.
According to Peskov, Moscow has repeatedly called for a direct dialogue between Kiev and the republics.
“It is impossible to make the decision without contacts with the leadership of these republics and without taking into account their opinion,” Peskov said.
On Sunday, an explosion hit a vehicle of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) near the Pryshyb settlement in the Lugansk region, which resulted in the death of a US national. The blast injured two more SMM members from Germany and the Czech Republic.