The Voice Of The Foreign Ministry
The program is conducted by Mikhail Sokolov.
<iframe src=”<a href=” http:=”” <a=”” href=”http://www.youtube.com” rel=”nofollow”>www.youtube.com=”” embed=”” z84u3huY7jo”=”” rel=”nofollow”>http://www.youtube.com/embed/z84u3huY7jo” frameborder=”0″ width=”773″ height=”380″></iframe>Mikhail Sokolov: In the Moscow Studio of Radio Liberty by Maria Zakharova, the Director of the Department of press and information of the Ministry of foreign Affairs of Russia. Let’s start the conversation with fresh information. The visit of U.S. Secretary of state John Kerry has ended, let’s summarize. I’ll take a quote from Vladimir Putin: “what we have achieved on the Syrian track, could be achieved only due to the position of highest political leadership of the USA, President Obama.” So what has been achieved, in your opinion?
Maria Zakharova: we Achieved a great deal. As today was the press conference Lavrov and Gentiloni, head of the Ministry of foreign Affairs of Italy, our Italian colleague said this phrase: “It’s a miracle that almost a month in Syria there is a truce”. I think it is that, despite differences, despite the huge number of opinions from different countries, different interests, really managed to achieve this miracle, at least the Italians think that it is a miracle, and for a month to show that reconciliation is possible, it works. And what is the truce? The armistice is the basis of this framework is a fertile ground for the negotiation process.
Mikhail Sokolov: Many doubt whether Russia was to intervene in the civil war in Syria.
Maria Zakharova: in Any case there was no need for Russia to intervene in the civil war. Those who doubt the need for this, they are absolutely right.
Mikhail Sokolov: And what did Russia?
Maria Zakharova: We did not intervene in the civil war.
Mikhail Sokolov: There is no civil war?
Maria Zakharova: There is, of course, there is civil strife. I don’t judge from the point of view of legal evaluation, because it is a very difficult situation, but the fact that there is a civil confrontation, certainly, especially, of course, military. But to him the operation of VC had no relationships.
Mikhail Sokolov: And who bombed?
Maria Zakharova: what! even now you don’t know?
Mikhail Sokolov: I don’t know. I was not there, I ask you.
Maria Zakharova: Kerry spoke yesterday in English for those who still had questions. This was an operation which was spent by the Russian side, of course, at the request of the Syrian leadership, which was aimed against terrorists, terrorist groups, international terrorists, and so on. So, I think for six months you would know about it.
Mikhail Sokolov: Alexander Soifer doubts, he said: “Why is Russia suddenly withdrew from Syria? From Syria return equipment and people – despite the fact that the victory over the Caliphate no. The only real result of five months of the campaign was the rupture of Russia with Turkey”.
Maria Zakharova: You know, it’s not just simplified, it’s a simplistic and incorrect view. I always try to be quite diplomatic in assessing the views of people who are not professionals, because people don’t have to know all the details. But in this case I will say that it is simplistic and wrong for several reasons.
Your listener suggests that the only result was to break relations with Turkey. Real results, about it today we spoke with our Italian colleagues, talked about it yesterday Kerry publicly and behind closed doors, talking about it all: the actual result of the operation of the Russian space forces in Syria was the formation of capabilities in General and the real start of the negotiation process and the beginning of the truce in Syria. It is absolutely a proven fact.
Mikhail Sokolov: And for schools and hospitals were not bombed by the Russian air force?
Maria Zakharova: It is a truce, we’re talking about, which failed to achieve for more than four years, it was achieved thanks to the operation of VC, which was sudden, but very effective.
About the fact that the sudden exit, the exit was very sudden. I don’t know who it was sudden, we’re initially told that the operation will be temporary in nature, it will be time-limited. Of course, nobody said how long it will last, because this is a military operation, it security, strategy and so on. But what clearly emphasized its time-limited nature – it was said from the very beginning. Another thing that many people wanted, I think your radio is also very tried.
Mikhail Sokolov: it is Not necessary to reproach us.
Maria Zakharova: and Before that we’ll get.
I really wanted to see a second Afghanistan. For those who wanted to see another Afghanistan, for them, of course, was an unpleasant surprise that the operation was over.
Mikhail Sokolov: Tell me, and the conflict with Turkey, too, is temporary?
Maria Zakharova: Yes, Of Course.
Mikhail Sokolov: And how it will be resolved? Maybe it was also discussed at the talks with John Kerry?
Maria Zakharova: No, with John Kerry on the bilateral relations of Russia and Turkey was not discussed. Of course, the Turkish factor in the Syrian settlement was discussed, because it is very serious. Because the Turkish side is blocking a very important element of these negotiations, and the connection of the Kurds to the negotiating process. Because without the Kurds – I can’t say that this is the main, but one of the main components and the population in General and the negotiation process – without it, no settlement of the long-term, stable impossible.
Mikhail Sokolov: Another topic, from what I understand, these negotiations were discussed is that the peaceful settlement in Ukraine, Donbass. What you have to say about that?
Maria Zakharova: You ask and I respond.
Mikhail Sokolov: And what do you know? We know the pieces.
Maria Zakharova: You ask specific questions, because I now will turn on, tomorrow we’re finished.
Mikhail Sokolov: Mr. Kerry said that President Obama is ready to lift sanctions if all provisions of the Minsk agreements are fully implemented, including the disposal of weapons and military and closing the southern border. Russia is ready to contribute?
Maria Zakharova: You know what it looks like? It’s like when the child say: you eat porridge, porridge would be there, be happy, beautiful, healthy, wealthy and successful.
Mikhail Sokolov: It’s Minsk agreement, all of these items, let’s implement them.
Maria Zakharova: All these phrases are about what the sanctions will cancel, when will be performed the Minsk agreements is about the same trivial. This phrase, which is repeated from time to time is not worth anything.
Mikhail Sokolov: And you can just implement the Minsk agreements?
Maria Zakharova: Can I finish? For one simple reason, because serious people, if it told the listeners, the artist on the street, perhaps this could be heed, but talking about it people are more than serious, people who are behind the enormous political, geopolitical processes, and when they say such banal things, of course, we understand that this is all just for ordinary people but not for professionals. With regard to the implementation of the Minsk agreements: can I ask, in what part of Russia doesn’t?
Mikhail Sokolov: I am here not the interviewee, I will answer. I hear from the Ukrainian colleagues, their main claim what does not stop attacks by insurgents and separatists. You must first make peace, then everything else.
Maria Zakharova: you know, I ask questions not because I want to interview you, God forbid, but to the General discussion moved on to specific things. You said that you do not stop the shelling. But we have a lot of time ago came to a situation where the armistice was reached, when it was the breeding of the parties. It is a fact, it was recorded by the OSCE and so on. But the question is that the breeding of the parties was necessary to start the political process, the negotiation process of two parties of the conflict, namely Donbass and Kiev, drafting a new Constitution and prepare elections.
Mikhail Sokolov: That is, Russia is not a party sure I understand you correctly?
Maria Zakharova: it, you know.
Mikhail Sokolov: How is everything? For example, I believe that Russia is supplying the separatists with fuel, weapons, ammunition.
Maria Zakharova: Your right to believe anything you want. You are the man and the journalist, you can assume anything you want.
Mikhail Sokolov: there is a Lot of evidence.
Maria Zakharova: There are documents, which have become an integral part of international law, such as the Minsk agreements. In the Minsk agreements in black and white, you can print in color, then it will be blue and pink, says that two conflicting parties are Donetsk, Lugansk and Kiev, uniting the word of the Donbass and Kiev.
It is written in those documents, which were endorsed by the Security Council, which has been signed by both Kiev and Donbass, which was adopted and declared that the only document on the implementation of the ceasefire and the political process generally, France, Germany, USA and so on. The US probably has a different view of things, but the whole world repeats one phrase – only Minsk. According to the Minsk process, Minsk agreements, the two conflicting parties.
Mikhail Sokolov: And one side Russia was supplying arms and ammunition. You like it?
Maria Zakharova: I like the clarity in the wording, I’m for it.
Mikhail Sokolov: so you for the wording, but I’m for reality. Mr. Kerry called on the Russian authorities to make every effort to contain separatists. Will deter the separatists?
Maria Zakharova: I want to say that the Minsk agreement has ceased to be a theory – it is reality. Question them what you said.
We stopped at a very important point: for what was given peace with, no one gave, reached. As Western countries have provided the corresponding impact on Kiev and the Russian Federation have had an impact on Donetsk and Lugansk, the truce worked. Which it was given? It was given to start the negotiation process on the elaboration of those provisions, which should become the basis for coexistence of Kiev and other parts of Ukraine in Donetsk and Lugansk.
Mikhail Sokolov: Coexistence, excuse me, is there such a term? There is, as I understand it, restore Ukraine’s jurisdiction over these territories, including over the border.
Maria Zakharova: We believe that it is part of Ukraine, you probably assume that they are not.
Mikhail Sokolov: I think that at the moment Ukraine has no control over these territories is a fact, and requires to enable it to control the border.
Maria Zakharova: So it is written.
Mikhail Sokolov: But not executed.
Maria Zakharova: you know, when should it be performed? You can then ask the question that we really stuck to reality: have you read Minsk agreement?
Mikhail Sokolov: I read the Minsk agreement.
Maria Zakharova: So it says that the border control will be restored when?
Mikhail Sokolov:you Know, there are different interpretations.
Maria Zakharova: What interpretation, there is written about it!
Dear listeners, I ask you, the document is small, there are only I think two or three pages read. It says: when the control will be restored in Kiev, Ukraine on his border, I mean on the territory of Donetsk and Lugansk. It says: when there will be a constitutional reform, when elections will be held, when will be implemented the Amnesty. In this sequence, the Western countries ensured the implementation of the Minsk agreements. I have a question for you: who violate the Minsk agreement and what Russia doesn’t?
Mikhail Sokolov: I will Answer you in the words of Ukrainian colleagues: because every day dying Ukrainian citizens, the Ukrainian military personnel, the Minsk agreements are not fulfilled in the first paragraph. It’s not my position.
Maria Zakharova: You are trying to be objective?
Mikhail Sokolov: You asked me a question, I answered.
Maria Zakharova: You are trying to be objective? After all, the task of the journalist to be objective and not to defend the view that it may be humanly close. But to see the facts, to compare them. The evidence suggests that the stalemate in the implementation of the Minsk agreements, to our deep regret, because this is a hard situation.
Maria Zakharova
Mikhail Sokolov: don’t shed crocodile tears, honestly. If not supplied the separatists with weapons, fuel, Russian money, and so forth, war in Donbass would have long since ceased. You know that perfectly well.
Maria Zakharova: If you talk the way you talk, in fact, arguing in genre fiction, I would have thought completely different, I would imagine that if it were not for the Russian Federation, I’m not sure, would now the population of Donbass is actually alive. For the tanks on Donbass were channeled Kiev.
Mikhail Sokolov: Tanks were sent in and Russia. “Buryat tankers”, the special forces who are now in Kiev in captivity are.
Maria Zakharova: And what they were sent there, too, you know – to suppress dissent.
Mikhail Sokolov: Dissent is when the bellies rip MPs?
Maria Zakharova: someone Who’s bellies were ripped open in the course of the Maidan, we now will not speak.
Mikhail Sokolov: This was not true?
Maria Zakharova: someone Who was set on fire in Odessa, unfortunately, still need to install the official Kyiv failed. And how long has it been?
Mikhail Sokolov: well, We don’t know who “Boeing” was shot down, right? Although there are claims that it was done by Russian “Buk”.
Maria Zakharova: how Much investigation in Odessa?
Mikhail Sokolov: You know, what are you asking?
Maria Zakharova: where are the people who murdered, e.g., Olesya Elderberry? They are in jail?
Mikhail Sokolov: You want to say that they are too humane justice in Ukraine? In Russia there are also unsolved murders. The organizers of the murder Nemtsov was not found. Singers, hope was found, and the organizers was not found. Why should we blame you there, I here?
Come on Kerry, we went to the side.
Maria Zakharova: We haven’t gone anywhere.
Mikhail Sokolov: Kerry urged the Russian leadership to hold back the separatists – it’s a fact. Want comment get.
Maria Zakharova: You said that you need to perform the Minsk agreement.
Mikhail Sokolov: And Kerry said that.
Maria Zakharova: I asked you a question: what Russia doesn’t? You said about the truce. I said that the cease-fire and withdrawal of the parties is several months, certainly not one hundred percent. But the question is that the truce creates a certain platform, you need to fill. The vacuum must be filled, it needs to be completed by negotiations.
Mikhail Sokolov: They’re coming negotiations.
Maria Zakharova: some September 1st! The question is, what do not go. The problem is, I’m just afraid to shock you, the problem lies in the fact that Kyiv refused, refuses, and unfortunately, as shown by the last meeting of the German format at the Ministerial level, will continue to refuse dialogue with the Donbas. The implementation of the Minsk agreements has stalled. Don’t want to sit at the table with people who represent Donetsk and Lugansk. There is no other way.
Hence the question, as you say, restore control over the border, as I say, constitutional reform and so on. The constitutional reform, the special status of Donbass, the holding of elections, as according to the Minsk agreements are written, all these things should be decided at the negotiating table between Kiev and Donbass. They refuse to sit down at the negotiating table with these people. Motivation is very simple that they do not perceive these people as legitimate representatives of something.
Mikhail Sokolov: Russia Dudayev is also not perceived as a legitimate representative of the separatists or Maskhadov.
Maria Zakharova: It is a very slippery path you want to go, for one simple reason. Kiev it is with these representatives of Donetsk and Lugansk, which now wants to sit at the negotiating table, signed a joint document. These documents have been approved by the Security Council. The guarantors of these instruments are such political heavyweights, as Merkel and Hollande. So what is the difference between the annual desire to sit down at the negotiating table, not only to sign documents on the same, but in a year?
Mikhail Sokolov: I’ll explain: Russian tanks of Debaltsevo. They were there, so we had to sign these agreements.
Maria Zakharova: You think that Kiev violated its own agreement?
Mikhail Sokolov: I didn’t say that, I said that it was pressure from Russia.
Maria Zakharova: It’s a lie, an absolute lie. This is not a fact, because the Minsk agreements, their implementation has been guaranteed in the presence of the President of Russia, France and Germany. What kind of pressure from Russia you say?
Mikhail Sokolov: You’re talking about negotiations in Minsk and I’m talking about the battlefield.
Maria Zakharova: These international legal documents are signed and guaranteed by presidents, if you do not want to recognize the President of Russia is your right, but there are people who you are obviously close, is Hollande and Merkel. What kind of pressure are you talking about? Are you saying that Poroshenko was forcibly tied to a chair and forced to sign?
Mikhail Sokolov: There are situations when even the capitulation is signed, no one tying her to a chair.
<iframe src=”<a href=” http:=”” <a=”” href=”http://www.youtube.com” rel=”nofollow”>www.youtube.com=”” embed=”” 2Rp67xPD8_8″=”” rel=”nofollow”>http://www.youtube.com/embed/2Rp67xPD8_8″ frameborder=”0″ width=”773″ height=”380″></iframe>interview with Muscovites:
