UKRAINE: Yulia Tymoshenko tells Chernobyl memorial that Ukraine is ready to fight Russian aggression on the eastern Ukrainian border

Record ID: 275872

  • Title: UKRAINE: Yulia Tymoshenko tells Chernobyl memorial that Ukraine is ready to fight Russian aggression on the eastern Ukrainian border
  • Date: 26th April 2014
  • Summary: KIEV, UKRAINE (APRIL 26, 2014) (REUTERS) EXTERIOR MEMORIAL/CROSS MILITARY PROCESSION WITH FLOWERS IN UKRAINIAN FLAG COLOURS MILITARY PROCESSION MARCHING PATRIARCH FILARET AND FIRST DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER VITALY YAREMA PROCESSION ARRIVE AT MEMORIAL SITE/ BELL SOUND ACTING PRESIDENT OF UKRAINE OLEKSANDER TURCHINOV STANDING WITH FLOWERS NEXT TO PATRIARCH AND YAREMA AT MEMORIA
  • Embargoed: 11th May 2014 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Ukraine
  • City:
  • Country: Ukraine
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVADTWEOEZ660VOKTYXHLLF3WTJC
  • Aspect Ratio:
  • Story Text: Ukrainian political leaders commemorating the 28th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster on Saturday (April 26) in Kiev said they were willing, ready and able to fight Russian aggression on Ukraine's eastern border.
    At a special ceremony at the Chernobyl memorial, acting president Oleksander Turchinov was joined by his Fatherland party leader Yulia Tymoshenko and Patriarch Filaret of the Kiev patriarchate of the Orthodox church to remember those who died in the world's worst nuclear disaster in the then-Soviet town of Prypyat on April 26, 1986.
    Hundreds of thousands of people died and more still suffer today as a result of the nuclear fallout from the accident.
    The event comes as tension in the east is rising with several towns whose administrative buildings are occupied by pro-Russian separatists and Russian troops are massed across the border.
    Addressing the memorial, Patriarch Filaret said Ukraine had handed over its nuclear weapons in 1994 as part of the Budapest memorandum in return for Russia's promise to respect Ukraine's territorial integrity, which included Crimea.
    The peninsula returned to Russia last month after Russian troops took over Ukraine's military bases there and held a referendum to leave Ukraine.
    The move has not been recognised by the majority of the international community which has called on Russia to de-escalate tensions in the east of Ukraine.

    "I have no doubt that we will win in this confrontation (against Russians). Why? Because we are on the side of truth. We are not aggressors, we are victims of aggression. We gave our nuclear weapons as a peace-loving country and we have been attacked by a guarantor," Patriarch Filaret said.
    Ukraine Fatherland party leader, Yulia Tymoshenko, released from hospital after the fall of president Viktor Yanukovich, launched an armed Resistance Movement last week to fight Russian troops should they cross into Ukrainian territory.
    She told those at the memorial the country was ready to fight Russian aggression.

    "I believe that today, we must take all the necessary steps together with the European Union, the United States of America and the whole of the democratic world, to stop aggressors peacefully, to do everything to make the Russian troops pull back from Ukraine's border, to unblock our cities and administrative buildings, and free hostages, and to make those whose hands are covered in the blood of Ukrainians stand before the court," she said.

    "If Russia continues in its aggression and does not abide by the decisions taken during negotiations, including the Geneva talks, Ukraine must be strong and must repel the invader so that he will never have such plans and intentions again," she added.
    Armed pro-Moscow separatists have detained a group of international observers and accused them of being NATO spies. On Saturday, leaders of the Group of Seven major economies agreed to impose extra sanctions on Russia over its intervention in Ukraine.
    The United States said its part of the new punitive measures, which U.S. officials said would target "cronies" of Russian President Vladimir Putin, could be unveiled as early as Monday (April 28) unless Russia moved fast to defuse the Ukraine crisis.
    The G7 leaders said Russia had not taken any concrete steps to implement an accord, signed in Geneva, that was intended to rein in illegal armed groups.
    They said in a statement that Russia had instead "continued to escalate tensions by increasingly concerning rhetoric and ongoing threatening military manoeuvres on Ukraine's border".
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