Security guarantees: Office of the President of Ukraine announces new phase of war and calls for decisive actions
OLENA ROSHCHINA – MONDAY, 29 AUGUST 2022, 23:39
The International Working Group on Security Guarantees for Ukraine, co-chaired by Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Andrii Yermak and former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, is finalising draft recommendations on future security guarantees for Ukraine.
Source: Office of the President of Ukraine
Details: During the third meeting of the group, which took place online, Yermak emphasised that the dream of security guarantees for Ukraine is progressively turning into a plan of action with clear time frames.
Quote from Yermak: "We are entering a new phase of this brutal war. Against the backdrop of the events unfolding on the frontlines, it is time for our partners to take new decisive steps to guarantee Ukraine's future security.
These guarantees should form a new security order on the European continent and prevent a new war in its heart."
Details: The Head of the Office of the President noted that a high-quality and comprehensive draft of recommendations had been compiled in less than two months as a result of the joint efforts of the group members.
He added that this document covers a wide range of guarantees – military, economic, political – and sanctions.
After the final version of the recommendations is complete, it will be submitted for consideration by President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
"With its publication on the website of the Office of the President, our diplomacy will receive a powerful boost in the context of negotiations with the governments of allied and partner states," Yermak stressed.
The Head of the Office of the President believes that future security guarantees should be incorporated into legally binding documents, in particular, treaties between Ukraine and the guarantor states.
Anders Fogh Rasmussen said that the updated (second) draft recommendations take into account key comments received from the previous meeting of the group.
He said that the draft’s main focus is on defence guarantees in the first part of the recommendations document; these defence guarantees form the basis of the group’s recommendations.
Rasmussen informed the meeting participants that Volkan Bozkır, former Minister for European Union Affairs of Turkey, will also be joining the group.
In addition, he announced that the group will now resume its work in a co-chair format which also entails one-on-one, bilateral consultations with certain group members on specific issues.
Yermak and Rasmussen noted that group members will have an opportunity to review the final version of the recommendations on security guarantees before their publication.
Background:
- On 29 August, the Kakhovka Task Force reported that Ukrainian forces had destroyed the majority of large bridges over the river Dnipro near Kherson and breached the Russian forces’ first line of defence in Kherson Oblast.
- Serhii Bratchuk, spokesman for the Odesa Oblast Military Administration, reported that a series of Russian targets have been destroyed on the Russian-occupied territory of Kherson Oblast, including a Russian military base at the Beryslav Machine Building Plant, a river crossing in Lvove, and an ammunition storage site in the village of Havrylivka, in the Beryslav district.
- A source in the Ukrainian Armed Forces told CNN that the Ukrainian military has taken four villages back from Russian occupation in the south near the city of Kherson, but the information has yet to be confirmed.
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