Russia, US thoroughly discuss possibility to deploy UN mission to Ukraine

Russia and the US have thoroughly discussed the possibility to deploy a UN mission to eastern Ukraine, Russian Presidential Aide Vladislav Surkov said following his meeting with US Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations Kurt Volker, held in Belgrade on November 13.

“We thoroughly discussed the Russian initiative on the deployment of a UN mission to Ukraine,” he said.

During the meeting, the US representative presented proposals concerning the Russian-drafted resolution. “Our American friends presented their proposals concerning our Security Council draft resolution, which contained 29 paragraphs.” “Our delegation came to the conclusion that three of them were acceptable,” the Kremlin aide added. According to Surkov, the parties decided to continue the work to bring their positions closer.

Both Surkov and Volker were confident that “the Minsk Agreements should be implemented.” “In order to do that, there is a need to accelerate the fulfillment of Kiev’s political obligations and at the same time strengthen security in the conflict zone,” Surkov said.

This was the third meeting between the Russian and US representatives held in 2017. Surkov and Volker earlier held talks in the Belarusian capital of Minsk on August 21 and in the Serbian capital of Belgrade on October 7.