Moscow’s stance on the election in Ukraine

On the 29 October 2014 Russia declared that it would recognise the election in Ukraine. The Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergey Lavrov, expressed that he was expecting an undivided government to be formed in Kyiv that would represent Petro Poroshenko’s political approach; Moscow viewed the current president of Ukraine as a partner concerning the implementation of the Minsk Accords.

Russia’s press and politicians had been focusing their comments on alleged violations of the electoral process, occasionally going so far as to brand it a farce. They were pointing to the pressure that a civil war exerts on voters, the exclusion of Donbas from the election and the fact that refugees were unable to vote. The reason they give for why the election has been recognised despite the reservations regarding its validity is that they want to respect the rule of non-interference with Ukraine’s internal affairs. The thesis that the election has given the government in Kyiv formal but not genuinely democratic legitimacy was being repeated. The Russian press were concentrating on elections in the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (scheduled for 2 November). The Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, announced that Russia would recognise the results of the election in Donbas.

• Primary Source

ESO: Key source: Ukrainian parliamentary election, 2014 http://www.europeansources.info/record/ukrainian-parliamentary-election-2014/

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