“Well, they didn’t look very hard, did they,” Bolton said responding to reports that the OSCE had not found Russian military units or observed the movement of Russian military equipment into eastern Ukraine.
Bolton alleged that Russia is “in the process of increasing their military control over provinces in Ukraine” and their territorial control in Ukraine “has grown very considerably,” though such claims are not supported by OSCE observer reports.
The just concluded Minsk agreement reached among Ukraine, Germany, France, Russia, and representatives of the Donbas are “shaky,” the former ambassador stated, adding “the odds of it being sustained are small.”
The Ukraine ceasefire will go into effect beginning on Sunday with the OSCE monitoring and verifying the ceasefire and military drawback.
On Friday OSCE Secretary General Lamberto Zannier reported that Russian individuals, but not Russian army units,had been observed fighting in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.
The crisis in Ukraine escalated to an armed confrontation in April, after Kiev sent troops to Ukraine’s southeast regions to suppress pro-independence forces there. Top Ukrainian officials, including President Petro Poroshenko, have accused Russia of directly interfering in the conflict, a claim that Moscow has repeatedly denied.
