Lugansk, 17 Feb – DAN. The Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics will provide humanitarian assistance to residents of Kiev-occupied Donbass areas, DPR and LPR Heads Alexander Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnitskiy said on Friday.
“We decided to implement a programme of humanitarian aid and environmental safety for our brothers and sisters living in Ukraine-controlled Donbass areas,” the Republics’ leaders said in a joint statement.
“The main guidelines for humanitarian assistance are medical and education services, pension payments and assistance to divided families,” the statement said.
The programme envisions humanitarian foundations for financial assistance and joint cultural, education and sport events involving residents on both sides of the contact line.
Zakharchenko and Plotnitskiy noted that Kiev-controlled Donbass areas are on the brink of humanitarian crisis; production is being discontinued in the zone of so-called “anti-terrorist operation”, living standards are plunging and infrastructure facilities are in disarray.
“We insist on the possibility to inspect water pumping systems at operating and non-operating mines, Popasnaya water utility, Lisichyansk refinery, Zarya (Rubezhnoye) and Azot (Severodonetsk) companies, Voda Donbassa water company, water treatment plants, chlorine storages, Avdeyevka coking plant, Konstantinovka state-owned chemical plant and Dzerzhinsk phenol plant,” the republics’ leaders said.
They also demanded unhindered access for humanitarian organisations to Kiev-controlled territory for monitoring, power-, water- and gas-supply facilities. “Let’s pool our efforts for the sake of survival and peace, for fighting those who sit in far-away Kiev, Brussels and Washington trying to make us quarrel, who profit from the war,” Zakharchenko and Plotnitskiy said.*jk