Poroshenko meets with Volker, sends 270 special agents to Azov region

Ukrainian President Poroshenko met with U.S. Special
Envoy Kurt Volker in Kyiv on Sept. 13 to discuss the armed conflict in Donbas,
sanctions against Russia, implementing the Minsk Accords, as well as energy
security and Nord Stream Two, the president’s press service announced. “Tough
circumstances but we are working together closely,” Kurt Volker tweeted.
Earlier this week, Volker told the Deutsche Welle news agency that the U.S. is
prepared to offer more military hardware for Ukraine to secure its control of
the Azov Sea coastline. “The Azov Sea is truly a subject for serious concern,”
he said. “Russia sharply boosted the presence of military ships and is
inspecting entering and exiting ships in an aggressive manner as never before.”

The same day, the State Border Service announced that
270 special forces agents were dispatched to serve in units on the coastline on
the Azov and Black seas. They will serve to boost law enforcement and border
control reserves, the border service head said in a statement. “The aggressor
isn’t sleeping as is mounting its forces, and we should be giving a dignified
response in the case of force majeure conditions,” he said. Earlier this week,
Ukraine’s Armed Forces announced it was strengthening its positions along the
Azov Sea coastline. The goal is “to ensure full control of the situation in the
region, support the activity of naval groups and ensure reliable defense of the
coastline,” said infantry commander Serhiy Popov in a statement.

Zenon Zawada: The military confrontation between Russia and Ukraine continues to
slowly but gradually intensify, the Azov Sea being the current frontline.
Volker has stated clearly that this is the U.S. stragtegy, with the intention of
gradually draining the Russian budget of its resources. Russian President Putin
has to decide on fulfilling the Minsk Accords with a UN peacekeeping mission in
the following weeks. Otherwise, we don’t see another window opening up for
peace (or expanded aggression) until months after the October 2019
parliamentary elections in Ukraine.