OSCE official should have chosen better words, Klimkin says

In offering his assessment of the armed conflict in Donbas,
OSCE official Alexander Hug should have selected words that would have
prevented a pro-Russian interpretation, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo
Klimkin wrote on his Facebook page on Nov. 6.  Klimkin said Hug tried to
perform his position as first deputy head of the OSCE special monitoring
mission in an unbiased fashion. Yet he exceeded the bounds of his position with
his comments, which forbid political assessments or offering his personal view.

On the same day, Iryna Gerashchenko, among Ukraine’s
negotiators at the Trilateral Contact Group peace talks in Minsk, wrote on her
Facebook page that she asked the chief monitor of the OSCE special monitoring
mission in Ukraine, Ertugrul Apakan, to comment on Hug’s “manipulative
statements” and distinguish whether they are his personal view, or the official
position of the OSCE mission in Ukraine. Hug’s statements “were incorrectly
phrased and are his personal view,” Apakan responded, according to
Gerashchenko.

In a Nov. 4 interview with Ukraine’s 1+1 television
news network, the outgoing OSCE monitoring mission official repeated his
position that he doesn’t view the Russian govenment as being directly involved
in the armed conflict in Donbas, citing only indirect evidence. When asked
whether he viewed Russia as the aggressor in the conflict, Hug responded, “No,
but I believe that Russia, as with Ukraine and certain districts of the Donetsk
and Luhansk regions, recognized that there’s a big problem that needs
resolving, and they all took upon themselves this responsibility.”

Zenon Zawada: We believe
Alexander Hug’s controversial statements were planned and politically
calculated. We believe Hug is seeking to preserve the overall prospects for
peace in Donbas by not angering the Russians in accusing them of aggression. He
also sought to preserve his successor’s access to Russian-controlled regions in
Donbas, to which his monitoring mission was often denied.

Yet in trying not to upset the Russian bear, Hug’s
comments ended up advancing Russian propaganda and narratives, as well as the
Russian defense in international litigation. His approach reflects the overall
European approach of thinking that the Russian leadership will respond to
offers of negotiations, diplomacy and concessions. Yet we have explained that
Russia, at least under Putin’s leadership, will not stop its aggression
campaign until it controls the Ukrainian territory.