OSCE monitors get partial access to Ukraine-Russia border in Donetsk region – Poroshenko

14:30, 15.10.2015 1 min read

President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko has said that monitors of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) have finally been able to gain access to part of the border with Russia in Donetsk region which is uncontrolled by Kyiv as a result of the recent Normandy Four talks in Paris.

"Today [on November 13] OSCE for the first time made an attempt to reach the [Ukrainian-Russian] border. In Luhansk region they were stopped and were not permitted to do that in certain territories of Luhansk region. But in Donetsk [Donetsk region] the mission for the first time reached the borders and carried out an inspection," he said in an interview with Dnipropetrovsk TV channels on Tuesday evening.

Poroshenko said that at the talks in Paris, Russia "promised that the OSCE would get access to the border."

"They [OSCE SMM monitors] have never had access [to the border[," he said, adding that OSCE did not even have the opportunity to check warehouses storing withdrawn arms.