REUTERS

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko will demand the deployment of peacekeeping forces in conflict-struck eastern Ukraine as he will address the United Nations General Assembly on September 24-26, according to Ukraine's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Volodymyr Yelchenko.

"As in past years, the President's visit to the UN General Assembly is scheduled and now being prepared. Conditionally, he will be there between Sept 24 and Sept 27, but this is yet to be confirmed," Yelchenko said, speaking at the meeting of the MFA Press Club in Kyiv, an UNIAN correspondent reports.

The diplomat added that President Petro Poroshenko would address the General Assembly on September 26, immediately after lunch break.

Видео дня

"The speech will concern not only the problems of the UN, but also questions Ukraine has to the United Nations, and first of all, something that the president has reiterated previously, almost daily, will be stressed – that we will continue to strongly demand and fight for the approval of the decision on the deployment in Donbass of a peacekeeping mission under the auspices of the United Nations," stressed Yelchenko.

He said that in the issue of peacekeepers, due to the destructive position of the Russian Federation, it is not possible to find any understanding, even with regard to the basic principles for deploying peacekeepers.

Read alsoUkraine preparing "unpleasant surprises" for Russia at UN General Assembly – Envoy

Also, during the speech, the president will raise the issue of the blocking by Russia of vessels heading to the Sea of Azov.

"I believe the president will surely remember the Holodomor issue, as this year marks the 85th anniversary of this tragedy, and we will try to draft and adopt during the session a special declaration of the UN General Assembly dedicated to this," the Ambassador said.

Poroshenko will also meet with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and the foreign minister of Ecuador, because this country this year presides over the UN General Assembly. There will be other bilateral meetings. At present, these meetings are being coordinated.

In addition, Poroshenko will meet with the leaders of Ukrainian organizations in the U.S., leaders of Jewish organizations, and businesses.

Read alsoUkraine's envoy to UN elected vice-president of 73rd General Assembly

As UNIAN reported, following the latest meeting in Berlin of Normandy Four foreign ministers on June 12, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin stressed Ukraine's position that the United Nations peacekeeping forces should receive a real mandate to disarm illegal armed formations and search for concealed heavy weapons throughout the occupied Donbas.

In his opinion, the powers of peacekeepers should not be limited only to the protection of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission observers.

Read alsoPeacekeepers may be deployed in Donbas as early as 2019 – Interior Ministry

At the same time, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Russia opposed the proposal of Ukraine and the United States that the UN mission take control of the occupied Donbas to organize elections.

At the same time, Klimkin said that the Normandy Four had substantively discussed the deployment of the UN peacekeeping mission.