Vladimir Zelensky was included in the Ukrainian delegation at the talks in Minsk, the first Prime Minister of the country, Witold Fokin. Earlier Zelensky was appointed head of the Ukrainian negotiators of the first President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk. According to analysts, Fokin, Kravchuk and veterans of Ukrainian politics: the first in October will celebrate 88 years and the second in January of this year, said the 86-th anniversary. Both have retired and are unlikely to make the negotiation process more effective, as the success of talks still depends on the position of Kiev, analysts say.

  • Vladimir Zelensky (left) and Leonid Kravchuk, together with Witold Fokin (right)
  • © president.gov.ua / Reuters

The President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky said that the first in the country’s history, Prime Minister Vitol’d Fokin will be part of the Ukrainian delegation in the trilateral contact group on settling the situation in Donbas.

“We invited Leonid Kravchuk (Kravchuk. — RT). Will work with it and Mr. Fokin, and our Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Reznikov and Mr. Demchenko (first Deputy Secretary of the NSDC Ruslan Demchenko. — RT), which is here. That is, we have quite a powerful group. Now I see only growth in the number of negotiations and meetings,” said Zelensky at a briefing in the city of chasiv Yar.

Witold Fokin served as Prime Minister from 1991 to 1992. Together with the first Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk, he participated in the signing of the Belavezha accords on the dissolution of the USSR. Since 1999, Fokin is the President of the Luhansk Association in Kiev. He also is President of the International Fund for humanitarian and economic relations of Ukraine with the Russian Federation.

According to the head of the Ukrainian delegation at the talks in Minsk Leonid Kravchuk, Fokine was invited to participate in the group because of his good knowledge of Donbass.

“He is known in the Donbass, he is 16 years in the mine. And we would like to have in the group the person knows the Donbass. So he could say what I want to do strategically, national and whatever the people who live there,” — said Kravchuk.

To replace Kuchma

We will remind, Leonid Kravchuk Zelensky was appointed to the post of chief negotiator for the settlement of the conflict in the Donbas on July 30. According to the head of the state, this choice is due to the fact that Kravchuk is a “powerful, wise, educated” and experienced person who enjoys authority both in Ukraine and in DND and LNR.

The Chairman of the contact group on settling the situation in Donbass Kravchuk was replaced by the second President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma, who held this position twice: from 2015 to 2018 from 2019 to 2020.

  • Leonid Kuchma
  • RIA Novosti
  • © Victor Shcheglov

According to Zelensky, Kuchma has done a great job, which is not always visible to society because of the closeness of the meetings in Minsk.

“He is really tired. There is no other reason. We are grateful to him again,” said Zelensky.

According to experts, his work at the head of the Ukrainian delegation, Kravchuk began with a rather scandalous statement. On 2 August he announced that he did not fully understand the components of the special status of Donbass, which is stated in the Minsk agreements.

“They want it was the territory with signs not only of some special status, but that it was a territory with the attributes of statehood. That is, they charge very high. Russia is talking about the special status, as recorded in the Minsk documents. But there is recorded so that we do not know what it is,” said Kravchuk in the air of TV channel “Ukraine 24”.

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According to him, at the beginning of the conflict in the Donbass, he appealed to the leaders of the DND and LNR with the proposal to formulate the components of the special status, but received no response.

“Or is it a special status, or is it something where there are signs of independence or autonomy, he said. — Write on what steps you could go to compromise, to negotiate.”

While Kravchuk believes that the situation in the Donbas should be talking about the “special” management system, which will differ from other regions of Ukraine.

“Maybe they are not infinite international summits to convene, and finally to conduct a domestic one? To have a foursome (Kravchuk, Kuchma, Poroshenko, Zelensky) and try to understand what is written in the Minsk agreement? The participants are all in the subject: two were in the contact group, one signed the Minsk documents, one made them part of the election program,” wrote the official representative of Russian foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova on his page in Facebook, commenting on the statement of Kravchuk.

In her words, “of the four have two questions on the “Minsk package” did not arise, they never stated that they do not understand something, vigorously discussing its implementation in world capitals and demanding that Moscow “not to impede”.

After about the misunderstanding of the essence of the Minsk agreements Kravchuk commented on the possibility of direct talks between Kiev and representatives of the republics. According to him, such formats must be sought, but the President of Ukraine should not negotiate personally — instead, it can make Witold Fokin.

Later the new head of the Ukrainian negotiators stated that it was necessary to create also a separate delegation to discuss the issue of “return” Crimea to the Ukraine.

  • Leonid Kravchuk
  • RIA Novosti

“We need to find separate approaches, separate concept, a separate philosophy, a separate proposal regarding the Crimea. But that it should be done, I have no doubt… I would suggest not to postpone this issue”, — he told in interview to TV channel “112 Ukraine”, adding that this topic may not be included in the agenda of the tripartite group.

“Absolute impasse”

Experts drew attention to the age of the head of the Ukrainian delegation in the negotiations: Leonid Kravchuk in January of this year celebrated his 86th birthday, and is included in the composition of the delegation Witold Fokine in October will celebrate 88 years.

“It is unlikely that figures such as Kravchuk or Fokin, can be useful in the negotiation process because they had long been engaged in politics, have no political weight and are not included in the decision-making process. It is obvious that the main reason for this decision Zelensky personnel,” — said in an interview with RT Deputy Director of the Institute of history and policy of the Moscow state pedagogical University, Vladimir Shapovalov.

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According to experts, Zelensky “no team, he has nobody to lean on, as evidenced by the constant change of officials and politicians in his entourage”.

This observation was confirmed by the source RT in the office of the President, who said that this kind of work, few agreed.

“Everyone understands that no real solutions to the former President or Prime Minister can not accept. They must reconcile their words with Zelensky and to Express their opinion have no right. The Minsk agreement, most likely, will not be fulfilled. Experienced politicians do not want to be responsible for their failure,” — said the interlocutor of RT.

In turn, the source RT in the party “Batkivshchyna” noted that it is difficult to imagine the work of the trilateral contact group in this format.

“What kind of negotiations can conduct Fokin? I’m sure he doesn’t even know what is written in the Minsk agreement. Obviously, during meetings all participants will read him the outline aloud, and so to pass the time. More representatives from Ukraine, unfortunately, can not”, — stated the Deputy.

According to Vladimir Shapovalov, Zelensky “is confused and does not understand what strategic decisions need to be made”.

“In this sense, the appointment is like trying to get away from the constructive work, including the composition of the negotiators people who are not empowered and do not have conceptual solutions out of the crisis. This is a political maneuver that has no specific task to conduct the negotiation process”, — says Shapovalov.

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Such personnel policy as a whole fit into the political course that Zelensky was elected to respect the Minsk agreements, he said.

“These people are not going to solve any problems in a peaceful settlement, but will only imitate the negotiation process. All decisions of the official Kiev in the last few months aimed at sabotaging the work of the contact group. Such an approach, including in respect of personnel, in fact, puts an end to the negotiations with the Donbas in the current format,” — said Shapovalov.

This view is shared by the source RT in the party “servant of the people”.

“Zelensky, of course, not very experienced politician, but even he would not have appointed Fokine in hopes of productive negotiations. I’m not even sure that the new members of the tripartite group will be able to correctly convey the information. Looks like he decided to use the experience of Poroshenko and to shift the responsibility on Russia”, — said the Deputy in an interview with RT.

In turn, Director of the Kiev center for political studies and conflictology Mikhail Pogrebinsky believes that in this case it is not important who is “to be a member of the Ukrainian delegation in the trilateral contact group”.

“Everything depends on the position Zelensky and his team, which takes the real decisions. Today Kiev is not ready to compromise, as the Ukrainian authorities have drawn a red line that doesn’t want to cross. It looks like an absolute dead end. That process of regulation has shifted, people need not to be changed, and the position of leadership of a country that is hopeless,” concluded Pogrebinsky.