MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Members of the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe's Special Monitoring Mission in eastern Ukraine (OSCE SMM) will not be allowed to enter Crimea and are not requesting this as they understand that they lack the necessary mandate, Russia's OSCE envoy Alexander Lukashevich said Friday.
"No, of course, because the OSCE Monitoring Mission is working on the territory of Ukraine. Crimea is Russian territory. We discussed at the very beginning that the mission would not apply to Crimea as part of the Russian Federation. But our Western colleagues consider the territory of Ukraine to include Crimea," Lukashevich told RIA Novosti.
According to the diplomat, the mission is not trying to enter the peninsula, understanding that its work is "limited to the current territory of Ukraine."
