U.S. Ambassador in Ukraine: Weak administrative institutions in Donbas helped for conflict expansion

13:07, 21.05.2016 1 min read

U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt has said that weak administrative institutions in Donbas had helped for expansion of the conflict.

The war was started in Donbas, not in Kharkiv, Odesa or Dnipropetrovsk, he said. It is not because Kremlin did not seek to implement the Novorossiya project, but because administrative management in Donbas was weak there, the diplomat said at the International Conference "Ukraine – EU: Turning Challenges into Opportunities" in Kyiv on Friday.

He said that the Ukrainian state was very weak and Russia got benefits from this.

Pyatt said that the Ukraine-EU Association Agreement is a road map, GPS-navigation on the way to the democratic state that would counteract Russian aggression.

Ukraine can do everything and the country has shown this. Ukraine has created the new police, the country shows resistance to the challenges it encounters, the diplomat said.