The resolution which was approved by consensus calls for the UN member nations to step up international cooperation to curb the pandemic, exchange information, scientific knowledge and advance experience. The resolution emphasizes the role of the World Health Organization and the United Nations in the fight against the spread of the virus of the new type.

Before voting, Russia insisted on a different version of the resolution. In the words of Serhiy Kyslytsya, Ukraine’s permanent envoy at the United Nations, the Russian text included an implicit demand for a general lifting of international sanctions. “Ukraine has blocked the Russian draft resolution at the UN General Assembly which under the pretext of struggle against the new coronavirus has opened up a window of possibilities for political manipulation, particularly a possibility of lifting sanctions”, said Kyslytsya.

“We will continue blocking Russia’s efforts to undermine the policy of sanctions”, declared Dmytro Kuleba, Foreign Minister of Ukraine. Thus, the Foreign Office of Ukraine believes that attempts of the Kremlin to convince the world that sanctions hamper Russia’s capabilities to resist the spread of the coronavirus infection are “a dirty manipulation”.

Meanwhile, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation has accused Germany and France of disrupting the creation of a consultative committee with the participation of representatives of the separatists-controlled districts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions (ORDLO). Andriy Yermak, the chief of the Office of the Ukrainian President, and Dmitriy Kozak, the deputy chief of the Administration of the Russian President, have reached preliminary agreements on the creation of such an advisory body.

Nevertheless, the Russian Foreign Office complained in its recent commentary, “Unfortunately, strange things began to happen after the prospect of a breakthrough started taking shape. Thus, during their telephone conversations the aides of the Normandy leaders of Germany and France deliberately avoided the issue of the support of the agreements reached earlier”.

In the opinion of Moscow, Kyiv followed the example of France and Germany and refused from the agreements on the creation of a consultative committee.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba declared earlier that the work to form a committee with the participation of ORDLO representatives had been suspended. However, he stressed, the structure of the trilateral contact group (TCG) remained unchanged.

“The group includes an attacking country ‒ Russia, a defending country ‒ Ukraine, and in-between ‒ the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The position of our Foreign Office is very clear: both the Ministry and I as the Minister are against any reformation of the trilateral contact group in Minsk”, said Kuleba.

Earlier, Chief of the Presidential Office Andriy Yermak said that Kyiv was not intended to refuse from the idea of creating an advisory council on Donbas and that this idea would be discussed with France and Germany.

During talks held on March 25, the TCG in charge of the settlement of the conflict in Donbas planned to sign officially a decision on setting up a consultative committee at the political team of the TCG.

It was proposed that for the first time the major negotiating parties in the political team would be only a delegation of Ukraine and representatives of the ORDLO, while Russia would be only an observer. However, after widespread criticism of that proposal, including a strong disapproval voiced by the presidential party “Servants of the People”, the decision was not signed.

The newspaper Holos Ukrainy