You're reading: Pyatt still puts hopes on April 17 Geneva agreements, says there’s no military solution

 U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey R. Pyatt told CNN TV news host Candy Crowley on April 20 that Ukraine is outgunned and outmanned militarily by Russia, so American foreign policy will continue to be focused on diplomacy in getting the Kremlin to back down from threats to dismember Ukraine.

“The fact is that the geography and balance of power is such there’s no military solution” to the crisis, Pyatt said.

Pyatt stuck to the April 17 agreement in Geneva as a framework for a solution to the crisis triggered by the Kremlin annexation of Crimea and its support for separatist movements in eastern Ukraine. However, a deadly shootout in the eastern Ukrainian city of Sloviansk overnight has undermined that accord.

Pyatt said he believes that the Kremlin has some influence over the Russian-backed insurgency, but that sentiment for secession from Ukraine is confined to “small isolated groups.” He cited monitors for the Organized Security and Cooperation in Europe who said that no more than 200-300 insurgents are operating at government buildings taken over by the Russian-backed separatists.

He said that Ukrainians have retaken one of the many seized government buildings and he believes that “efforts from outside to stir division and separatism” aren’t going to find resonance.

“Ukrainians want to be part of a unfired, prosperous politically stable country,” Pyatt said.

Pyatt’s comments are coming at a time of increasing criticism of Obama’s handling of the crisis in Ukraine, even by some of his supporters who say the president simply hasn’t acted decisively or with a sense of urgency. One reason for that, according to former U.S. State Department spokesman Jamie Rubin, is that Americans are in an isolationist mood after the draining wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“One of the problems is that the American public has looked inward and doesn’t seem to care what’s going on in the rest of the world, particularly in places where you can’t pronounces their names,” Ruben told CNN TV.

But Ruben said that it’s the president’s duty to rally the public and European allies “behind the seminal principle that big countries don’t get to gobble up little countries,” Ruben said.

Here are excerpts on Ukraine from the April 17 press conference by U.S. President Barack Obama

Here is the April 17 statement from Geneva talks among Russia, Ukraine, the United States and the European Union 

Kyiv Post chief editor Brian Bonner can be reached at [email protected]