French minister slams Russia votes on Ukraine trip
Ukrainian officials said Paris and Kyiv had moved closer to an agreement that would supply Ukrainian forces with French Caesar artillery systems
France on Tuesday condemned Russia for organizing referendums on occupied Ukrainian territories asking voters to join Russia, and for escalating its nuclear threat rhetoric. French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna said while visiting Kyiv on Tuesday that France was determined “to support Ukraine and its sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
She described the ballots as “mock referendums” during a joint briefing with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. Ukrainian officials said Paris and Kyiv had moved closer to an agreement that would supply Ukrainian forces with French Caesar artillery systems. Colonna said the European Union will keep proceeding with sanctions against Russia and had started working on the eigth package of sanctions without waiting for the results of the organized by Russia votes in the occupied territory.
Colonna also announced the arrival of a new mission of French experts from the Institute for Criminal Research of the National Gendarmerie, which will make it possible to identify the victims and collect evidence of serious crimes committed in the recently recaptured by Ukrainian cities in the Kharkiv region. She said Russia’s “illegal war” threatened the very foundations of the international rule based order.
Kuleba for his part said the referendums were a “performance which won’t have any consequences and influence on the politics and diplomacy.” He added the ballots don’t impose any real threat on Ukraine but prove that Russia doesn’t want to resolve the war peacefully.
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Kuleba thanked France for the military support the country provides to Ukraine. “Today, we took another step forward in solving the issue of transferring new Caesar artillery systems to Ukraine, which have already demonstrated their high effectiveness on the battlefield,” he announced. Since the start of the war, France has given Ukraine more than two billion dollars in aid supporting different sectors.
