Russia may begin a “peacekeeping” operation in Ukraine within the next two days, according to comments made on July 3 by sources close to Russia’s Foreign Ministry.
“There is such
an option… The situation is complicated. Two days ago we advised (Ukrainian
President) Petro Poroshenko to ‘freeze’ the conflict in Donetsk and Luhansk
oblasts for a few months, so that the rebels and the Ukrainian army stop
fighting… Poroshenko did not accept the plan, and every day innocent people are
dying,” the source told Russian news agency Znak.
“A peacekeeping
operation from the Russian side is ready: if it is launched, several Russian
units will form a protection ring around the large towns, in order to ensure
the safety of peaceful citizens,” the news agency quoted the source as saying.
The reliability
of the statement – as well as the identity of the source – remain unclear.
According to Ukrainska Pravda, its credibility is attested to by the fact that
deputies of the Russian State Duma have been instructed to remain in Moscow
over the following days amid the possibility of an emergency meeting being held.
Ukrainska Pravda
also cites Znak journalist Katerina Vinokurova as saying
information supplied by the same Foreign Ministry source in the past has always
proved reliable.
The claim
has provoked a strong response from Kyiv. Security
Council Secretary Andriy Parubiy called it “a threat of direct aggression
against Ukraine,” adding that peacekeeping forces can only be introduced under
the aegis of the United Nations.
The
news comes amid further reports of a military build-up in Ukraine’s east, where
the government’s resumed “anti-terrorist operation” entered its third day.
Parubiy denied that Russian troops had been withdrawn from the border with
Ukraine, claiming that around 40,000 servicemen remain.
“The statement that Russian troops have been pulled back from the
border is untrue. There was no pullback of troops, but quite the contrary,
there was a [troop] rotation,” he said at a briefing in Kyiv on July 4,
according to Interfax.
Yuriy Stets,
head of the information security department of Ukraine’s National Guard, said 20
tanks and 122 armoured vehicles from Russia have been recorded in Luhansk
region.
In the meantime,
further rumours of a rift between separatist forces are emerging.
Russian
state-owned news agency RIA Novosti reported three desertions among rebel ranks on July 4, citing an assistant to rebel
commander Igor Strelkov. On the same day, a video was posted
online showing a visibly shaken Strelkov saying Sloviansk will be destroyed
within two weeks if the rebel forces currently in control of the town do not
receive assistance.
“If Russia does not conclude a ceasefire or intervene
militarily in our name, in the name of the Russian people living here, we will
be destroyed. This will happen within the week, maximum two. And the first to
be destroyed will be Sloviansk, with all of its inhabitants,” Strelkov says in
the video.
Also on July 4,
a statement posted on the official website of the self-proclaimed Luhansk
People’s Republic announced the dismissal of the LPR government, including a
document signed by its leader Valeriy Bolotov.
In the meantime,
preparations continue ahead of another round of OSCE-mediated peace talks, slated
to take place in Ukraine between
Kyiv, Moscow and representatives of the two self-proclaimed republics in the
Donbas. The group should meet “no later than July 5 with the goal of reaching
an unconditional and mutually agreed sustainable ceasefire,” according to a
document signed by the parties during a July 2 meeting in Berlin.
Amid shifting dynamics in the military conflict in Ukraine’s east, rhetoric
on both sides has intensified. Russia’s
Foreign Ministry on July 2 demanded that the Kyiv reinstate a ceasefire
abandoned by Poroshenko on July 1 and cease its military campaign.
“Again
we resolutely demand that the Ukrainian authorities — provided they are still
able to evaluate sensibly the consequences of the criminal policy they conduct
— to stop shelling peaceful cities and villages in their own country, to return
to a real ceasefire in order to save human lives,” the Foreign Ministry said.
At a press
conference on July 3, Deputy Foreign Minister of Ukraine Danylo Lubkivskiy
issued a stark rebuke to Moscow.
“We are warning
the whole international society against becoming hostages of the alternative
reality which the Kremlin is trying to impose in such a consistent and
thoughtless way. There is only one voice that the world does not and cannot
trust: this voice comes from the Kremlin. The world demands real actions from
Russia,” Lubkivskiy said.
Kyiv Post staff writer Matthew Luxmoore can be reached at [email protected] and on Twitter at @mjluxmoore.
