Comment from Daria Morozova on outcomes of meeting of Humanitarian Subgroup

Comments and statements of the Ombudsman News

Unfortunately, the last meeting of the Working Group on Humanitarian Issues did not bring the expected progress.

The Ukrainian side still takes an absolutely unconstructive position, which is contrary to the letter and spirit of “Minsk” on the issue of procedural “cleansing” of persons who returned home during the exchanges of 2019-2020, as well as attempts in every possible way to interfere with a breakthrough in solving this issue. There are certain signed agreements that we have fully implemented, and Ukraine must take the same steps.

The duality of Ukrainian side’s position, which is more concerned about earning political points in front of its citizens, in the form of another ambitious statement about “preparing a new exchange” than a real desire to fulfill its obligations, that now force us to carefully check each moment, even the most imperceptible, in the preparation of subsequent exchanges… In particular, we are going to fully recheck all documents issued to the participants of the previous exchanges for their legality and whether they have legal force on the territory of Ukraine.

I call on the Ukrainian side, to start finally acting not only in words in front of journalists, but also to prove their intentions in reality. We must resolve the issue with previous exchanges as soon as possible in order to start working on new ones.