Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has warned against sabotaging peace negotiations between Moscow and Kiev.
“Russia will not engage in a cat and mouse game as it did in previous years with the peace plan for eastern Ukraine,” Lavrov said in a video distributed by the ministry.
The minister said that Russia does not want a referendum on a possible treaty between Moscow and Kiev to resolve the conflict.
“There is a very high probability that the negotiation process would start all over again in the event of a negative outcome in a referendum, ”Lavrov warned.
This was the first time Lavrov openly rejected Ukraine’s idea to put a possible treaty on the country’s neutrality to a popular vote after the withdrawal of Russian troops.
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According to him, the situation in the small Ukrainian town of Bucha near Kiev was being used to divert attention from the negotiations.
He categorically rejected Ukraine’s accusations that the Russian army had carried out a massacre there.
Russian FM warns against sabotaging peace negotiations with Kiev
