Separatists in Minsk represented by ‘DPR PM’ Borodai? (photo, video)
ONT has published a video from the meeting of the contact group in Zaslauye. Donetsk separatists are shown there.
“The fire will be ceased in the corridor checked by the OSCE mission today. Both sides have agreed to transport the Boeing passengers’ belongings within two days,” Ukrainian vice PM Volodymyr Groysman commented on the results of the first day of negotiations in Minsk.
The contact group meeting began in Zaslauye on the afternoon of July 31 and continued the next day. The information about it was very limited but Belarusian TV channels showed similar short videos about it in the evening. ONT mentioned the three sides of the negotiations – Leonid Kuchma, Russian Ambassador to Ukraine Mikhail Zubarev and the head of the special OSCE group in Ukraine Aldelheid Talvini. The presence of the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic representatives was also mentioned. No names were given. However, you could see… Alexander Borodai in that video. He was together with some man in a dark suit and a woman. Borodai calls himself DPR PM and only Girkin-Strelkov occupies a higher position there.
Separatists at the meeting in Minsk.
Borodai’s photo.
Borodai’s arrival is Minsk is real – he was noticed in the restaurant Ugolyok in Moscow a few days ago. Separatists’ attitude to the meetings in Minsk is very serious.
Ukrainian ex-Ambassador to Minsk Roman Bessmertnyi explained the absence of Ukraine’s official representatives at the meeting (Kuchma is just an authority, not an official representative):
“They will not negotiate with enemies due to their commitment to Ukraine and their patriotic feelings. Officials can only accept the enemy’s capitulation now; they will not talk to separatists. That is why the meeting cannot be considered negotiations. Separatists cannot participate in negotiations,” he wrote in his article on the website of Novy Chas.
Meanwhile, Belarusian official mass media pay more attention to the meeting of Alyaksandr Lukashenka and Leonid Kuchma on July 31 rather than to the meeting in Zaslauye. The Belarusian President stressed thrice that he had agreed to Petro Poroshenko’s suggestion to conduct the meeting in Minsk not for the sake of PR but in order to develop relations with Ukraine.
