Likely Successor to OSCE’s Tagliavini Present at Ukraine Peace Talks

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said that likely successor of Swiss diplomat Heidi Tagliavini, set to represent the OSCE in the Trilateral Contact Group on Ukraine, was present during Wednesday’s peace talks in Paris.

PARIS (Sputnik) – The likely successor of Swiss diplomat Heidi Tagliavini, set to represent the OSCE in the Trilateral Contact Group on Ukraine, was present during Wednesday’s peace talks in Paris, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said.

“We had the opportunity to meet the candidate, he was here today on the sidelines of our meeting,” Karasin told reporters.

The deputy foreign minister added that it is up to the OSCE to announce who is set to take over after Tagliavini. “I will not say names so as not to violate the ethics of international organizations."

Talks in the so-called Normandy format were held in Paris on Wednesday. One of several formats in which Ukraine peace talks have been conducted, it includes the representatives of Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany.

The Trilateral Contact Group is comprised by representatives from Kiev, Moscow, the OSCE, as well as Ukraine’s eastern breakaway regions of Donetsk and Luhansk.

The Swiss foreign ministry announced last week that Tagliavini would step down as OSCE’s envoy to the Contact Group.