BERLIN, February 8. /TASS/: German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock visited the line of contact in Donbass on Monday, spending about 40 minutes there and calling for de-escalation of the situation around Ukraine, the Bild reported.
The foreign minister asked the commander of the Ukrainian armed forces to explain the current state of affairs in Donbass. Baerbock, as shown in the photographs published by the newspaper, was wearing a black bulletproof vest and a hard hat.
"I'm here to get an idea of what it means that we are still at war in the center of Europe," Bild quoted her as saying.
"These places make it clear how important it is that we now revive the Minsk agreements so that we can come to a situation where there is peace and people can continue to live in the region that is their home," she said. The minister reiterated the need to resolve the Ukrainian crisis through diplomacy. "We will not be able to prevent aggression from the Russia by military means, so I will do everything so that we move forward step by step at the negotiating table," she said.
On Monday and Tuesday, Baerbock was on a visit to Kiev. She met with her Ukrainian counterpart Dmitry Kuleba, but the previously planned meeting with President Vladimir Zelensky did not take place. According to Reuters, that was due to scheduling issues.
The Minsk agreements are at the heart of the peaceful settlement of the conflict in Donbass. They envisage a ceasefire, the withdrawal of weapons, an amnesty, the resumption of economic ties, a profound constitutional reform in Ukraine that will take into account the special status certain regions of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions. The Minsk agreements remain unfulfilled, as Ukraine refused to implement their political points, citing unresolved security issues.
