Ukraine

With increasingly alarming reports from Ukraine on the occupation of government buildings and growing tensions in cities in eastern Ukraine, Rebecca Harms, President of the Greens/EFA Group in the European Parliament, called on the OSCE mission to Ukraine to immediately and consistently carry out its duties:

"The OSCE, as the guardian of European security in Ukraine, must make its presence felt. The OSCE has until now kept a disappointingly low profile, making little difference, and has dashed the hopes that had been placed on its Ukraine mission. Much time has already been wasted on agreeing a common line, even though this mission was decided on weeks ago. Having acted too late on the conflict in Crimea, the OSCE must now show that it has the will and the means to act as a common security organization. The mission must carry out its observations where it really can make a difference. And it must now produce credible reports on events in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv and Transnistria in particular.

"The OSCE Mission should also ensure that it closely follows Russian military movements on the border with Ukraine, and that it shares this information publicly. Because at the moment, it is one word against another - Vladimir Putin speaks of the withdrawal of Russian troops but NATO has not seen any evidence of this.”