WORLD_ UKRAINE_ Russia, US trade jabs over faltering Ukraine deal

Russia, US trade jabs over faltering Ukraine deal

AFP
By Marc Burleigh in Kiev and Bertrand de Saisset in Slavyansk
39 minutes ago

Kiev (AFP) - Moscow and Washington each called Monday for more action from the other to save a troubled deal aimed at easing the crisis between Ukraine's new Western-backed government and pro-Russian separatists in the east.

As US Vice President Joe Biden began a two-day visit to Kiev -- a pointed show of American backing for Ukraine's new leaders -- Washington and Moscow each put a radically different spin on a crunch telephone call between their diplomatic chiefs on reviving the accord reached last week in Geneva.

Under the deal, signed by Ukraine, Russia, the United States and the European Union, pro-Kremlin rebels holding a string of eastern towns were supposed to disarm and give up the buildings they have seized.

The accord was meant to lower the heat on the worst confrontation between Washington and Moscow since the Cold War, but each side has accused the other of violating it.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov each urged the other to put pressure on his side in the crisis -- in Kerry's case, on the Ukrainian government, which Moscow accused of "grossly breaching" the Geneva deal; in Lavrov's, on the separatist rebels, which Washington sees as backed by Russia.

Kerry told Lavrov that "concrete steps" to defuse the crisis should include "publicly calling on separatists to vacate illegal buildings and checkpoints, accept amnesty and address their grievances politically", said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.

In Moscow, the Russian foreign ministry said Lavrov had asked Kerry to "pressure Kiev to stop hotheads from provoking a bloody conflict and to encourage the Ukrainian authorities to strictly fulfil their obligations", the Russian foreign ministry said.

Lavrov also accused Ukraine's government of an "inability and unwillingness" to rein in Pravy Sektor ("Right Sector"), an ultra-nationalist group the separatists blamed for an attack Sunday on one of their checkpoints in the flashpoint town of Slavyansk.

The shootout, started by unidentified attackers, broke a brief Easter truce and killed at least two separatist rebels. -

Military moves, sanctions -

US President Barack Obama has threatened more sanctions on Moscow if the Geneva accord is not implemented soon, beyond those already imposed by the United States and the European Union.

But Lavrov said it was the Ukrainian government that was violating the deal and told reporters in Moscow that sanctions would fail.

"Attempts to isolate Russia have absolutely no future because isolating Russia from the rest of the world is impossible," he said.

His country, he said, was "a great power, independent, and it knows what it wants".

Russia, which annexed Ukraine's Crimea peninsula last month after sending in troops, has massed a military force estimated at 40,000 soldiers on Ukraine's eastern border.

The United States and NATO have responded by boosting their own forces in eastern Europe. A report in The Washington Post said the United States was poised to send ground troops to neighbouring Poland.

But Obama's preferred weapon is sanctions. The ones imposed up to now, barring travel and freezing assets of Putin allies and friends, have however had little impact on Russia's actions so far.

The EU is divided on going further, with some member states worried that increased punishment could jeopardise supplies of Russian gas.

Biden, who on Monday was being briefed by US embassy staff in Kiev ahead of meetings Tuesday with Ukraine's interim president and prime minister, was to speak about the country's energy security.

- 'We are defending ourselves' -

In Ukraine's east, the insurgents remained firmly entrenched in public buildings they have occupied for more than a week.

Although highly trained military personnel whose camouflage uniforms are stripped of all insignia have been seen helping the rebels secure the some 10 towns they hold, Putin denies they are Russian special forces -- a stance echoed by the self-declared mayor of rebel-held Slavyansk.

"There is not a single representative of the Russian armed forces here. Nor of the state structures of Russia," said Vyacheslav Ponomaryov, blaming the Ukrainian authorities for the hostilities.

"If they had not come to us we wouldn't need any weapons. We are defending ourselves," he told AFP.

However, The New York Times published photos of military fighters on the ground who were seen in Georgia in 2008 -- when Russia invaded -- as well as in Crimea, and said some had been identified as Russian soldiers and intelligence operatives.

Meanwhile, Viktor Yanukovych -- the Kremlin-backed president toppled in the pro-EU protests that unleashed the current crisis -- demanded Kiev withdraw its armed forces from the separatist east to avoid a "bloodbath", the Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported.

Ukraine's new government last week launched a military operation to try to dislodge the separatists, but failing badly to do so it put it on hold until at least Tuesday, after the Easter holiday.

A spokesman in Kiev for the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which is monitoring implementation of the Geneva agreement, told AFP there was "no confirmation" of the separatists leaving occupied buildings.

Spokesman Michael Bociurkiw said the OSCE planned this week to triple the number of monitors in the country. Currently there are 100, more than half of whom are in the east.

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