The Contact Group in Minsk Agreed to a Complete Ceasefire on the Day of Knowledge

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Editor:

There’s much bootless and uninformed talk about a junta offensive going on now. It’s nothing but Langley dezinformatsiya, and Fort Russ fell for it. There are no reports of an “offensive” on DAN or LITs, nothing in English on Sputnik or in Russian on RIA, nor is there anything on ITAR-TASS. There are reports in the clueless Western media with no correspondents in the actual warzone… they don’t need ’em, as they uncritically publish Langley’s handouts… that’s true of the NY Times, the Washington Post, and The Economist…

THIS is what’s going on… there are peace talks in Minsk… truly, you can’t believe a thing that comes out of Langley (Orthodox people… what does that tell you about Potapov, Paffhausen, and Webster? Perspirin’ minds wanna know…)…

BMD

The meeting of the Contact Group to resolve the conflict in the Donbass, which ended in Minsk last night, showed that compromise at the negotiating table can find you a solution… if only a small one.

A New School Year Without Junta Shelling

Special representative of the OSCE chairman Martin Sajdik told reporters after the talks that all members of the Contact Group expressed an intention to bring about a ceasefire in the Donbass on 1 September, saying, “The Contact Group considers it necessary to ensure a sustainable ceasefire on the Contact Line during the first school week”. The DNR and LNR delegates, D V Pushilin and V N Deinego, expressed cautious hope in a media interview that junta attacks on their territory would cease by next week.

Delivery of Coal Given the Green Light

The Contact Group viewed the work of the subgroup on economic issues as a success. Sajdik said, “We’re pleased to announce restoration of railway infrastructure on the Nikitovka-Maiorsk and Yasinovataya-Skotovataya lines. This allows us to restore coal shipments, which are important to operate thermal power plants, which supply electricity and heat to the entire Donbass. We plan to send a water facilities mission, to provide both sides with water”. Deinego explained, most likely, the mission would start work next week, and that work on the railway infrastructure would begin then, too. Pushilin said that this subgroup showed the best result so far in Minsk, “We planned the work ahead of the scheduled arrival of the experts and settled other technical details that’d help us address economic issues”.

No Changes on the Political Front

The Political Affairs subgroup of the Contact Group, as before, spent all its time discussing the law on the special status of the Donbass and local elections there. Deinego told reporters, “The political situation is quite complicated, so, this subgroup continues to follow usual courses. We agreed to continue to work using video conferencing. I think that these contacts would bring results at our next meeting on 8 September”. Sajdik added that he decided to consult throughout September with both sides on a weekly basis.

Security Subgroup Opened a New Negotiation Marathon

Meanwhile, negotiations within the Security subgroup haven’t ended. Not counting breaks, consultations have been going on for more than 20 hours. According to the Belarus Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the meeting will continue in the next half hour. Sajdik said, “Further skirmishes won’t solve the situation on the ground and won’t provide social, economic, and political benefits to the population, which it expects and deserves”. The DNR delegation noted some positive developments in the negotiation process. Pushilin said, “Currently, there’s progress, there were a lot of constructive ideas and proposals. We hope that we’ll put all this on paper and prepare a document for signing. We’re talking about the withdrawal of weapons of calibres below 10-cm from the Contact Line”.

27 August 2015

DAN Donetsk News Agency

http://dan-news.info/politics/kontaktnaya-gruppa-dogovorilas-o-polnom-prekrashhenii-ognya-k-dnyu-znanij.html

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LNR Ministry of Construction sez Russian Federation will Help Prepare Housing and Communal Services for the Heating Season

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Today, Aleksei Rusakov, LNR Minister of Construction, Housing, and Communal Services, told us that the Russian Federation would help in preparing housing and communal services for the heating season, saying:

Of course, we also had problems with materials, but today we agreed on delivery of humanitarian aid from the Russian Federation. We’ll help in the delivery of these items. By the end of August, we should have deliveries from Russia of boiler pipes, heating pipes, and valves, none of which we make here. After the last heating season, we established a timetable for preparing housing facilities for the new season; all thermal heating plants, heat networks, and enterprises now operate according to this schedule.

26 August 2015

LITs Lugansk Information Services

http://lug-info.com/news/one/rf-okazhet-pomosch-v-podgotovke-obektov-zhkkh-respubliki-k-otopitelnomu-sezonu-minstroi-6072

LNR Ministry of Construction will Start Setting Up Mobile Housing for DPs Starting 1 September

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Today, Aleksei Rusakov, LNR Minister of Construction, Housing, and Communal Services, told us that his ministry would start setting up mobile housing for displaced persons beginning on 1 September, saying:

We haven’t begun to do this yet; we should start on 1 September. There are questions about funding and documents. We’re not going to build new housing, but we’d finish all construction in progress. There are four multi-storey residential buildings in Alchevsk, Zorinsk, Perevalsk, and Lugansk. These houses have finished exteriors; they have finished roofs, but they lack their interior finishing and windows. We’ll get them in order and finish the work on them. In future, local authorities, together with the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy, would determine who’d get the apartments in these buildings. I think that, given the work that we’ve already done, we should be able to hand over some of these buildings before the New Year.

Earlier, Rusakov reported that the LNR authorities developed a program to speed up refurbishment and construction of mobile housing stock for displaced people. This will improve living conditions of those now living in temporary dorms.

26 August 2015

LITs Lugansk Information Centre

http://lug-info.com/news/one/sozdanie-manevrennogo-zhilogo-fonda-dlya-pereselentsev-nachnetsya-s-1-sentyabrya-minstroi-6075

LNR Ministry of Construction sez Repair Work on High-Rise Buildings Will Begin in September

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Aleksei Rusakov, LNR Minister of Construction, Housing, and Communal Services, told us that repair work on war-damaged apartment houses would begin in September. He stated that over a thousand apartment buildings suffered damage due to shelling by the Ukrainian aggressors over the past year, saying:

The recovery plan for the second stage includes 470 high-rise residential buildings. Active repair will begin in parallel with our completing the first part of our plan, at the end of August and beginning of September. We’re awarding contracts for repair, and we have a list of priority sites that we must start with. We’re beginning with the most heavily damaged buildings. Of course, repair on some apartment buildings began earlier. Both in-house and commercial crews are going to do the work. In Lugansk, the Office of Capital Construction is doing some of the work. For example, we’ve started work on 27 Demekhin Street and 8 Mirnom Square, along with the building at Zarechny Square and Gayevoi. As I said, we repaired some of the buildings without waiting for the second phase, but the main part of the work will begin in September.

26 August 2015

LITs Lugansk Information Centre

http://lug-info.com/news/one/aktivnoe-vosstanovlenie-mnogoetazhek-v-lnr-nachnetsya-s-sentyabrya-minstroi-6076