Donetsk, Apr 23 – DAN. Ukrainian pension payments debt to DPR pensioners has approached 130 billion hryvnia (4,6 billion USD), the DPR Minister of Trade and Social Policy Larisa Tolstykina said speaking at the Round Table on Donbass Civilians Rights Protection.

"Ukraine's total pensions debt to DPR residents is 128.9 billion hryvnia as of April 1, 2021. Including 9.6 billion hryvnia of pending pensions to residents with disabilities."

She said that the Republics consistently raise the issue of the retirement benefits at the economic subgroup meetings, but Ukraine is not willing to resolve the situation.

The Round Table is organized as part of the Russians’ Unity: Protection of Rights and Freedoms International Forum.

Kiev-imposed economic blockade of Donbass has been in place since November 15, 2014. Then-president Petr Poroshenko ordered to halt all social payments to the region and banned bank operations there.

The two-day forum opened in Donetsk on Thursday. It gathered some 500 delegates including LPR parliament speaker Denis Miroshnichenko, Russian parliamentarians Andrey Kozenko and Alexey Zhuravlyov, historians, culture experts, community activists and representatives of young people from the Donbass Republics and Russia. *ot