"We must try to make a decision next week at a meeting of the Permanent Council and I hope that we will be able to do so next week," Zannier told RIA Novosti on the sidelines of the informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in Riga.
Zannier also expressed concern that a simultaneous discussion of the mandate's extension and the expansion of the mission's staff could delay the decision on the mandate extension.
"Let us extend the mandate first and then think about how to expand the mission and make it stronger, provide it with necessary technologies, including drones," Zannier stresed.
Earlier on Friday, "Normandy Four" envoys during talks in Berlin supported the extension of the mandate of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission in Ukraine and called on the organization to expand the mission's staff, according to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier also on Friday urged the OSCE to extend the mandate of its monitoring mission in Ukraine as soon as possible.
The mission was deployed on March 21, 2014 at the request of the Ukrainian government. OSCE experts were tasked with impartially monitoring the conflict between independence supporters and government forces in the country and facilitating dialogue between the warring parties.
