REUTERS

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin states that Russian observers cannot monitor Ukraine  elections either from the political or the legal points of view.

Speaking at a joint press conference with Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Jean Asselborn, Ukraine's top diplomat said: “And despite the fact that, as we all believe, the question of Russian observers has exhausted itself, I'd like to say once again that we will have no observers [from the Russian Federation] either long-term or short-term, none of them,” according to an UNIAN correspondent.

“Observers from an aggressor state which has violated all possible and impossible principles of international law and moral principles cannot observe the holding of democratic elections,” the foreign minister said.

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“This is impossible neither politically nor legally, as you perfectly understand, nor simply from a moral point of view. And of course, we do understand that official Russian observers don't work for democracy, they work for the relevant special services of their country,” added Klimkin.

As UNIAN reported earlier, on February 7, the Verkhovna Rada prohibited citizens of the Russian Federation from registering as official observers at the presidential elections in Ukraine, elections of people's deputies of Ukraine, and local elections.

Chief of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, Inhiborg Solrun Gísladóttir, expressed disappointment with the decision. According to her, the ban to Russian observers was contrary to Ukraine's obligations before the OSCE and its member states.

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On February 6, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine noted that the ban was not contrary to the international obligations of Ukraine in the field of free and democratic elections.