Donetsk, Nov 8 – DAN. The OSCE has confirmed that the withdrawal of forces and hardware from the disengagement area of Petrovskoye will start on Saturday, 9 November 2019.
“The Trilateral Contact Group, with the participation of representatives of certain areas of Donetsk and Lugansk regions of Ukraine, agreed on the date and time of the start of the renewed withdrawal of forces and hardware from the disengagement area of Petrovskoye. The withdrawal of forces and hardware will start on Saturday, 9 November 2019, at 12:00 Kyiv time," the press statement published at the OSCE website reads.
LPR and DPR representatives at a meeting in Minsk in September 2016 initialed a framework agreement on partial pullback of forces in Donbass that was also signed by representatives of Ukraine, Russia and OSCE. The document provides for three security areas around Zolotoye, Stanitsa Luganskaya and Petrovskoye (DPR territory). The disengagement has been completed in all three areas by now; however, Kiev forces deploy manpower and hardware in Zolotoye and Petrovskoye areas in violation of the agreements.
On October, 9, 10 and 11 Kiev failed three attempts to disengage forces and hardware on the contact line in the Zolotoye area. Ukrainian nationalistic formations set on resisting the disengagement arrived in the town. Later on, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky ordered Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov to clear Zolotoye of nationalists.
The Package of Measures for the Implementation of the Minsk Agreements was adopted by the Contact Group on Ukraine on February 12, 2015 and supported by member states of the Normandy Four (Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France). The UN Security Council approved the document by Resolution 2202 and called upon all the sides to ensure full implementation of the Package of Measures
The document provides for comprehensive ceasefire, withdrawal of all heavy weapons from the contact line, starting a dialog on reconstruction of social and economic ties between Kiev and Donbass. It also envisages carrying out constitutional reform in Ukraine providing for decentralization and adopting permanent legislation on a special status of certain areas of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions. *ot