Ukraine’s representative in Trilateral Contact Group: Militants do not take letters for captives even from OSCE

The militants did not allow giving letters to Ukrainian captives in Donbas, which were handed over by the OSCE mission representatives.

Iryna Gerashchenko, the First Vice Speaker of the Ukrainian Parliament, Ukraine’s representative in the humanitarian subgroup of the Trilateral Contact Group, posted this on Facebook.

“In Minsk, the OSCE representatives gave me back my letters of support to our servicemen in captivity. The militants did not allow a third-party and neutral OSCE mission to hand over those letters to captives. This, by the way, clearly shows the opportunities and impact of international mediators in the negotiation process,” she wrote.

According to Gerashchenko, she “demanded that Russians” should convey the letters with the “humanitarian convoys”, but they refused.

OSCE coordinator at the humanitarian subgroup of the Contact Group on Donbas, Tony Frisch, was not allowed to meet with prisoners in the occupied territories when he had visited the occupied territories last week.

In addition, the militants refused to provide information about their actual location. The representatives of the Red Cross, the Doctors Without Borders or other missions are not allowed to visit the captives, Gerashchenko said.

She also noted there was no news about the release of captives yet.