Chairman of the Luhansk regional council Valeriy Holenko has asked the country's government to stop the anti-terrorist operation (ATO) in the eastern regions.
“On behalf of the people of the Luhansk region, I hereby demand that
the country’s government and ATO coordinators stop the war immediately!
Stop the fratricide and bloodshed!” Holenko said in a statement posted
on the regional council’s website on May 22.
The operation in the Lysychansk area is “essentially a war against your own people,” he said.
The ATO held ahead of the presidential election is not coincidental,
Holenko said. “It is clear that prior to the presidential election
someone is very eager to boast military victories and thus staged the
horrendous spectacle. Except that on the ‘stage’ we have live people,
not actors! And they die in earnest! And together with them dies the
hope for a possibility of a civil resolution of the conflict. Ukraine
itself is dying,” the regional council chairman said.
The nationwide roundtables on national unity are a farce, he also said.
“Like I said already, all these roundtables of national accord are a
decoration and farce organized solely for a pretty TV picture.
Unfortunately, this morning this certainty proved right. When a peace
memorandum is signed for television cameras, while in reality troops and
heavy vehicles are being sent against civilians, it is immediately
clear what is false and what the true goals are of those who give
orders,” Holenko said.
He urged his fellow citizens not to take part in crimes organized by
politicians: “Nobody’s presidential ambitions are worth dying for.”
