Ukraine PM says country is ‘still in a state of war’
Arseniy Yatsenyuk tells Kiev conference Ukraine remains in a state of war and says he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin 'wants to restore the Soviet Union'
Ukraine is “still in a state of war” with neighbouring Russia despite a ceasefire between Kiev’s forces and Moscow-backed rebels in the east, the country’s prime minister said on Saturday shortly after a second convoy of Russian trucks rolled into Ukraine.
Speaking at a conference with politicians and business leaders in Kiev, Arseniy Yatsenyuk said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “goal is to take the entire Ukraine”.
“Ukraine border guards and customs were not allowed to examine the cargo and vehicles ... Nobody knows what’s inside.”
“He cannot cope with the idea that Ukraine would be a part of a big EU family. He wants to restore the Soviet Union,” Yatsenyuk said.
The prime minister didn’t mention the second convoy of Russian trucks that had entered rebel-held territory in eastern Ukraine earlier Saturday, reportedly carrying with almost 2,000 tons of humanitarian aid.
The last truck crossed onto Ukrainian soil early on Saturday from the Russian border town Donetsk, some 200 kilometres miles east of the Ukrainian city with the same name, Rayan Farukshin, a spokesman for Russia’s customs agency, told reporters by phone. He could not confirm the number of trucks, but news agency ITAR TASS reported that about 250 were heading toward the city of Luhansk.
The Russian emergency ministry, which coordinated previous humanitarian aid deliveries to Ukraine, could not be reached for comment about the convoy.
Colonel Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian National Security and Defence Council, told journalists on Saturday that the convoy had crossed “illegally” onto Ukrainian territory.
“Ukraine border guards and customs were not allowed to examine the cargo and vehicles,” he said. “Representatives of the Red Cross don’t accompany the cargo. Nobody knows what’s inside.”
Lysenko’s relatively mild comments on the second convoy and the silence of more senior Ukrainian officials shows how dramatically the mood has shifted in the Kiev government since August. President Petro Poroshenko has been at pains to prove that last week’s ceasefire deal has yielded improvements on the ground in east Ukraine. On Friday, he lauded the deal, which has been marred by violations since it was imposed last week, as a “fragile but efficient peace process”.
In August, Ukrainian officials said that a first convoy of humanitarian aid from Russia would be seen as an invasion of the country, and loudly protested over any attempts by Russia to unilaterally bring in the aid. Eventually Russia sent its trucks across the border and into rebel-held territory without the oversight of the International Red Cross, contrary to an agreement signed between Ukraine and Russia.
A representative of the International Red Cross Moscow office said they had not been informed about the current convoy, either.
“We were not officially notified of an agreement between Moscow and Kiev to ship the cargo,” Galina Balzamova said Saturday.
Lysenko said that six Ukrainian servicemen had died since the truce. He also confirmed that 12 rebel fighters had been killed by Ukrainian forces near Sea of Azov city of Mariupol, where he said they were doing reconnaissance work – the first such admission that they have inflicted casualties on the rebel side since the ceasefire began.
In a statement posted online early Saturday, the Donetsk city council said that there had been fighting near the airport throughout the night. Two shells had hit residential buildings in the area but no casualties were reported.
Continuous rocket fire could be heard overnight in downtown Donetsk, and a column of three GRAD rocket launchers – with all its rockets still in place – was seen moving freely through the rebel-held city on Saturday morning.
