You're reading: Ukraine greets convoy from Russia with great suspicion

Ukraine has warned that Russia’s humanitarian aid coming to the war zone in the east will be regarded as an act of aggression unless it is approved by the Red Cross.

“Any convoys that are accompanied by or include servicemen and do not have a Red Cross mandate are interpreted as aggressors,” Col. Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for the National Security and Defense Council, said on Aug. 14. “A reaction to them will be adequate.”

A convoy of about 300 trucks carrying what Russian officials say is humanitarian aid stopped on Aug. 14 and stretched along a field near the city of Kamensk-Shakhtinsky in Russia’s Rostov Oblast, some 25 kilometers from the Izvaryne checkpoint on the border with Ukraine, several Western journalists accompanying the trucks reported.

The convoy, which left Moscow on Aug. 12, has provoked an outcry because Ukrainian authorities and the public suspect Russia of either using the trucks as a façade for resupplying Kremlin-backed separatists with more mercenaries and weapons, or is planning to organize a provocation in order to justify open Russian military intervention in Ukraine under the guise of a “peacekeeping” force.

Kyiv Post+ is a special project covering Russia’s war against Ukraine and the aftermath of the EuroMaidan Revolution.

The aid has not yet been authorized by either Ukraine or the Red Cross, although multilateral negotiations about it have continued since Aug. 8.

BBC reporter Steve Rosenberg wrote on Twitter on Aug. 14 that the trucks had “turned off the M4 highway” towards the Russian town of Donetsk across the border from Izvaryne checkpoint.

New York Times journalist Andrew Roth tweeted that he had “looked inside several trucks, found buckwheat, sleeping bags and a mechanics workshop.”

Financial Times journalist Courtney Weaver posted a picture of military equipment that “pulled up behind the convoy.” She also tweeted that the convoy was accompanied by military helicopters. Photographs of these helicopters have appeared on social networks.

Weaver wrote that most of the trucks seemed to be green Russian military trucks with either white paint or white tarpaulin over them.

The Ukrainian government has repeatedly said that the trucks could only enter if they authorize the convoy. But Ukrainian authorities’ attempts to control the convoy’s movement could be thwarted by the fact that the Izvaryne checkpoint, where it is heading, is controlled by separatists.

Lysenko, the spokesman for the National Security and Defense Council, said that Ukrainian authorities would block the convoy’s movement if it tried to cross the border without Ukraine’s permission. He added that the trucks should be first inspected by Ukrainian authorities and the Red Cross.

Valery Chaly, deputy head of the president’s administration, said on Aug. 13 that Ukrainian authorities had prevented an attempt by the trucks to cross the border.

However, some efforts were underway to organize talks on the issue.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Aug. 14 that Laurent Corbaz, head of Red Cross operations for Europe and Russia, would hold negotiations with Russian and Ukrainian authorities on the convoy in Moscow and Kyiv, Polish news agency PAP reported.

Viktor Sherbanuk, head of the Ukrainian Red Cross’ information department, said by phone that he had no information on the status of the talks.

While the Kremlin has touted the convoy as a genuine humanitarian effort, analysts were skeptical about its motivation.

Political analyst Vitaly Bala told the Kyiv Post there could be two explanations for the Russian convoy.

The first one is that, by sending aid, Russia is trying to improve its image and make sure that it is not treated as a party in the conflict, he said.

The second explanation is that the Kremlin will try to organize a provocation as an excuse for sending troops under the guise as peacekeepers and thus “freeze” the conflict, he said. For example, Russia could organize a false attack on the convoy, Bala added.

“This scenario is similar to (Georgia’s breakaway republics of) Abkhazia and South Ossetia,” he said.

As Russia claimed that it wanted to help civilians in the war zone, Ukraine also stepped up its humanitarian efforts.

The government sent 75 trucks with 800 tons of aid from Kyiv, Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk to the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts on Aug. 14, the president’s press office said.

Tycoon Rinat Akhmetov is also planning to send at least 10,000 tons of humanitarian aid to the two regions, the businessman’s SCM group said in a press release. The first shipment is scheduled for Aug. 20.

Kyiv Post staff writer Oleg Sukhov can be reached a [email protected].