Russia dissatisfied with exchange between Ukraine and Croatia on best practices for the integration of occupied territories
The Russian Foreign Ministry believes that Croatia's plans to share its experience of peaceful reintegration of occupied territories with Ukraine will not contribute to the settlement of the conflict in the Donbas. The Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department of Information and Press stated this in comments connected with statements on the revitalization of the Croatian working group on cooperation with Ukraine.
"We have paid attention to the statements made at the level of the heads of government within the framework of the Croatian-Ukrainian talks in Zagreb, regarding plans to revitalize the working group on cooperation with Ukraine established in October 2016 by the Government of Croatia aimed at sharing the Croatian experience of 'peaceful reintegration of the occupied territories', which allegedly can be applied to Donetsk and Lugansk, with Kyiv. We are forced to once more emphasize the inefficiency and inappropriateness of such steps," the statement said.
The Russian Foreign Ministry noted that Zagreb unilaterally submitted heavy pages on the Balkan crisis of the first half of the 1990s, "thereby playing up to Kyiv."
In the opinion of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Croatia must demand that Kyiv "once and for all stop bombarding the Donbas, lift the transport and socio-economic blockade of the region, and abandon restrictions on free access to information for the population."
A working group for Ukraine's support was created in Croatia at the end of 2016, and that the heads of government of Ukraine and Croatia recently signed a plan of interaction for the working group for 2017, which envisages cooperation primarily in the area of reintegration of territories.