MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th September, 2018) Russian President Vladimir Putin is not going to hold phone talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron on the assassination of the leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) Alexander Zakharchenko, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the Izvestiya newspaper.
On Friday, Zakharchenko and his bodyguard were killed in a bomb blast in a cafe in the center of the DPR capital of Donetsk, according to the DPR authorities. Eleven others were reportedly injured.
"No," Peskov said answering the question whether the Normandy Four leaders were going to hold negotiations following the death of Zakharchenko.
On Tuesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that it was inappropriate to organize the Normandy format meeting now, especially given the fact that neither Berlin, nor Paris expressed their condemnation of Zakharchenko's assassination. At the same time Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said that he saw no alternative to the Normandy Four talks on the Ukrainian reconciliation.
According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Zakharchenko's murder demonstrated that people, who chose terror as their strategy, did not want to seek a peaceful resolution to the conflict in Donbas.
