Europe yesterday stepped up diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis in Ukraine, with German Minister of Foreign Affairs Frank-Walter Steinmeier arriving in the country to push Kiev authorities and pro-Moscow rebels to come together at the negotiating table.
Steinmeier’s efforts came amid guarded optimism over the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s pronouncement that Moscow supports its roadmap to resolving the crisis through talks, disarmament and elections.
Russia’s lukewarm endorsement on Monday of weekend independence votes in Ukraine’s eastern provinces of Donetsk and Lugansk also allayed fears that Russian President Vladimir Putin would move quickly to annex the territories, as he did with Crimea earlier this year.
Photo: EPA
Yet Moscow kept pressuring Kiev, insisting that talks on regional rights must take place before a presidential vote on May 25 and accusing the pro-Western interim government of refusing “real dialogue.”
Later yesterday, the European Commission was to host Acting Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk in Brussels to offer support and discuss how to defuse a crisis that has brought the West’s relations with Moscow to their lowest since the Cold War.
After talks with Yatsenyuk, Steinmeier said the situation in Ukraine remained “very threatening,” but that he hoped progress was being toward on a peaceful resolution.
Calling for “a national dialogue under Ukrainian leadership,” Steinmeier said: “I hope this will create the conditions to take a step to bring back occupied territory, disarm armed groups step-by-step and reinstall the authority of the state.”
He also said presidential elections will “play a crucial role” in bringing the country out of crisis.
Steinmeier was later due to meet Interim Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov and travel to the southern city of Odessa.
The fresh diplomatic flurry comes after rebels in eastern Ukraine appealed on Monday to join Russia following what they claimed were victories in autonomy referendums.
Both EU and US officials said the votes were illegal, but Moscow said it “respects” the results and called for talks with rebels in Donetsk and Lugansk, home to 7 million of Ukraine’s 46 million people.
Kiev and Western leaders have accused Moscow of backing the rebels and on Monday, EU foreign ministers set new sanctions against Russians and Crimeans involved in the crisis, while Canada also slapped fresh sanctions on a dozen Russian and Ukrainian separatists.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS