Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics refuse to cede control over border with Russia to Ukraine

 “Ukraine seeks to regain control over parts of the border with Russia that we control. We can only agree to international monitoring of these parts of the border and only on the condition of reaching a full and comprehensive political solution to the conflict and restoring economic and social ties with Ukraine, as confirmed by the agreement between the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (on the one part) and Ukraine (on the other), which guarantees safety to their population and political institutions under the guarantee of Russia and the European Union,” according to a statement signed by DPR and LPR leaders and representatives from a number of public organizations, obtained by Interfax on Oct. 30.

This is precisely what was declared by the Donbas representative position statements published in Minsk on September 1 and which became the basis for the Sept. 5 protocol on implementation of the peace plan, the authors recalled.

We ask Russia and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) to pressure on Kyiv into complying with the Minsk Protocol aimed at settling the situation in southeastern Ukraine, the document said.

The appeal emphasized the lack of a possibility to implement the presidential law over a special status for Donbas.

“Article 1 of this law indicates that a list of the regions granted a special status shall be approved by a Verkhovna Rada resolution. No such resolution has been made. And so the law is not effective anywhere and is legally void,” the document said.