Interfax: Lavrov dubs signing of EU-Ukraine deal political provisions geopolitical game

MOSCOW. March 21 (Interfax) – The purpose of signing the political provisions for the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement is not to take care of the interests of the Ukrainian people. This is an attempt to score in a geopolitical game, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.

“In my opinion, this step was not dictated by the interests of the Ukrainian economy, the interests of the Ukrainian people as a whole and in aggregate. This is another attempt to score in a geopolitical game,” Lavrov told reporters on Friday.

The Kyiv authorities signed the agreement at a time when “the Ukrainian state had found itself in a profound crisis and people who proclaimed themselves the authorities did not enjoy support or legitimacy in the eyes of a huge part of their own population,” the minister said.

“Speaking of the free choice of people, I have alw ays deemed it right … to freely choose the Ukrainian leaders and the way Ukraine will be in the first turn. Only after they agree upon what to do next in their own home, after they reach national concord, they will be able to solve problems, which are a source of profound contradictions, primarily, inside Ukraine,” Lavrov said.

The chiefs of state and government of 28 member states of the European Union and the EU leaders signed the political provisions for the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement in Brussels on Friday in the attendance of Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk.