"I would like to strongly emphasize that the Russian Federation as an aggressor country cannot and will not participate in this peacekeeping operation,” Poroshenko said.
“We do not agree to such a format for the peacekeeping mission, creating the threat of legitimizing [the presence in Ukraine of] several thousand soldiers of the Russian military contingent. We already have enough [such] ‘peacekeepers,’" the president said.
As UNIAN reported earlier, on February 18, the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine decided to address the UN and the EU with the appeal for deployment of peacekeeping operation in Ukraine. The peacekeepers are planned to be deployed along the demarcation line in the Donbas and uncontrolled areas of Ukraine’s state border with Russia.
