LPR recalls security guarantees for frontline area works until kidnapped officer is freed

LPR has recalled its security guarantees for any works along the contact line, until the kidnapped LPR officer Andrey Kosyak is liberated from Ukrainian captivity, the head of the LPR Mission to the JCCC Michael Filiponenko said.

"Until our observer is released, we recall all the security guarantees issued for the works along the line of contact," he said.

A Ukrainian army special operations group captured the representative of the LPR Office at the JCCC Andrey Kosyak in the Zolotoye security zone on October 13. The Ukrainian delegation in the Contact Group claimed that “the LPR officers at the JCCC were reconnoitring abandoned Ukrainian troops positions under the guise of mine clearance.” The LPR demanded that Kiev immediately release Kosyak. LPR Head Leonid Pasechnik said that further dialogue with Kiev within the Minsk format made no sense until it had returned the LPR representative in the JCCC.

The Ukrainian government launched the so-called anti-terrorist operation against Donbass in April 2014. Conflict settlement relies on the Package of Measures for the Implementation of the Minsk Agreements, signed on February 12, 2015 in the Belarusian capital by the Contact Group members and coordinated by the Normandy Four heads of states (Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine). The UN Security Council approved the document by Resolution No 2202 of February 17, 2015 and called upon the parties to ensure its implementation.

The document provides for comprehensive ceasefire, withdrawal of all heavy weapons from the contact line, starting a dialogue on reconstruction of social and economic ties between Kiev and Donbass. It also envisages carrying out constitutional reform in Ukraine providing for decentralization and adopting permanent legislation on a special status of certain areas of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions.

To facilitate the work of the Contact Group, four working groups were set up under its aegis to deal with issues of security, politics, return of internally displaced people and refuges, as well as with social, humanitarian, economic and rehabilitation issues. *t