Donetsk, Feb 27 - DAN. DPR and LPR shall place under receivership enterprises operating under Ukrainian jurisdiction and shall halt coal exports to Ukraine if Kiev doesn't lift the transport blockade by the beginning of March, said DPR and LPR heads Alexander Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnitskiy.
"We are forced to declare that if the blockade continues into March, that is after Wednesday midnight, we shall place under receivership enterprises operating in the republics under Ukrainian jurisdiction. We shall halt coal exports to Ukraine. There is neither opportunity no settlement schemes for the exports. We shall rearrange production for Russia's and other countries markets. It was our first promise on the agenda when we proclaimed the Republics."
The leaders also maintained that the transport blockade of Donbass introduced by Kiev and executed by radicals interrupts the operation of many enterprises and runs counter the Minsk Agreements. Thus, Ukraine authorities show their inability to care about their citizens.
The new round of economic blockade of Donbass started in January 2017. Former participants of the offensive blocked railroad between Gorskoye and Zolotoye (LPR territory). The radicals said the aim was to interrupt trade with LPR. Later they blocked Svetlanovo station in vicinity of Pervomaisk, the railroad tracks in the area of occupied Artyemovsk (DPR) and Yasinovataya-Skotovataya stretch.
Ukrainian Rada extremists supported the "trade blockade", while radicals said the drive shall be permanent.
On 16 December, Ukraine National Security and Defence Council Secretary Alexander Turchinov called for tougher economic blockade against the Donbass Republics. Turchinov, a key figure behind Donbass bloodbath, believes that the ban on movements of goods and cargoes to LPR and DPR will enable Kiev to faster “liberate” the territories it does not control.
On November 15 2014, Ukrainian President Petr Poroshenko signed the decree halting the payment of pensions and allowances in the conflict zone.