MOSCOW. March 30 (Interfax) - Russia sincerely hopes that the tensions growing on the line of contact in Donbas would not transform into combat actions, Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov said.
"We sincerely hope that nobody would resort to this madness. We do hope for that. There's nothing more to say here," Peskov said in an interview published in the Argumenty i Fakty weekly, when asked whether Moscow could refuse to support the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR) if the tensions in the area escalate into combat actions.
"As concerns the Normandy format, the things are in a bad way," Peskov said. "It can be said that, during President [Volodymyr] Zelensky's time in office, there has been absolutely no progress in implementing either the Minsk Package of Measures or the subsequent agreements reached in Paris," he said.
The tensions along the line of contact in Donbas are growing, Peskov said. "In fact, the earlier moderate achievements have been dashed. The tensions are growing, and nobody sees any reason to gather at the top level," he said.
Kyiv's intentions are not clear enough, Peskov said. "Kyiv keeps saying all the time that the Normandy-format leaders should meet. Kyiv has been speaking about some new proposals, which we couldn't find anywhere. But what's most important is that we've repeatedly heard over the past half a year that Kyiv believes that the Minsk Agreements are dead. That those agreements can't be implemented, that there is a need for new documents, and so on. This is perhaps the most dangerous thing," he said.
Apart from the Minsk Agreements, there is no other basis for international efforts to achieve a settlement in Donbas, and what is more, these agreements were signed by the leaders of the self-proclaimed republics, Peskov said.
"The Ukrainians have absolutely rejected the idea of any dialogue with them for now. Hence, no new agreements can be achieved a priori, because, how can you settle some conflict while one party doesn't want to communicate with the other?" he said.
It is absolutely impossible to speak about any settlement plans without taking the self-proclaimed republics' opinion into account, he said.
"That's absolutely impossible. But the Minsk Agreements are agreements that were adopted in the form of an official UN document," Peskov said.
"We're trying to find a way to break this vicious circle with our partners from Berlin and Paris. And from Kyiv, too. But it's very difficult to speak with Kyiv. We've been unable to find a solution so far," he said.