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Restoration of trust a necessary condition for secure reintegration of Ukraine

Published on Friday, 14th of December 2018

Sixth public session of the National Platform “Dialogue on Peace and Secure Reintegration” was held in Kyiv, Ukraine on 23 November 2018. The Platform session focused on the issue of humanitarian interaction with Ukrainian citizens in uncontrolled territories and the international practice of confidence-building measures. Antti Turunen, Ambassador at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, emphasized that restoration of trust between divided communities is a necessary condition for secure reintegration of Ukraine.

The National Platform “Dialogue on Peace and Secure Reintegration” was organised in Kyiv for the sixth time.

The National Platform hosts public events involving representatives of Ukrainian central and local executive authorities, Members of Parliament, representatives of local communities and regions, public organizations and international experts, diplomatic organizations and missions. Read more on the Platform here.

A special guest of the event was Antti Turunen, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, responsible for mediation policy, former UN Representative in the conflict negotiations in Georgia (2010-2017).

Turunen mentioned in his speech that political will to resolve a conflict is not always enough – it also requires a societal context. Therefore, sometimes the issues of humanitarian and cultural interaction should be “removed” from the context of the conflict’s political agenda. Communication on resolving a conflict can be started by opinion leaders.

Ambassador Antti Turunen.

“If a country wants to restore its full sovereignty and control over its territory, then it is important to pay attention to what worries the local people, who live on both sides of the contact line. When contacts and communication  between the divided communities are made more complicated, then the separation also in the minds of the people starts to become the reality, the new normal”, emphasized the ambassador.

The round table participants also discussed other aspects of humanitarian interaction with Ukrainian citizens in the uncontrolled territories and identified a whole range of issues that need to be addressed to establish dialogue.

Among the speakers of the sixth meeting of the National Platform “Dialogue on Peace and Secure Reintegration” were Hryhoriy Nemyrya – Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights, National Minorities and Interethnic Relations; Heorhiy Tuka – Deputy Minister for Temporarily Occupied Territories and Internally Displaced Persons; Yuriy Yekhanurov – former Prime Minister of Ukraine; Alain Aeschlimann – Head of the Delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Ukraine; Volodymyr Lyamzin – Deputy Head of the Department of Civil-Military Cooperation of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (CІМІС); Noel Calhoun – Deputy Representative, UNHCR Ukraine.

Among the speakers were also Jock Mendoza-Wilson – Director of International and Investor Relations, System Capital Management; Yulia Tyshchenko – Head of the Democratic Processes Support Program of the Ukrainian Center for Independent Political Research; Volodymyr Lupatsiy – political scientist; Oleh Saakyan – political scientist; Ihor Kozlovsky – President of the Center of Religious Science Studies and International Spiritual Relations; Oleksandra Dvoretska – Vostok-SOS initiative; Vitaliy Pyrovich – Deputy Head of the Center for the Study of Russia and the Occupied Territories, editor-in-chief of the Dilova Stolytsya (Business Capital) weekly; Olesya Yakhno-Byelkovska – political scientist; Oleksiy Semeniy – Director of the Institute of Global Transformations, and others.

The initiators of the National Platform “Dialogue on Peace and Secure Reintegration” are independent Ukrainian public organizations, including the Ukrainian Center for Independent Political Research, Center for Security and Development, NGO “Socio-humanitarian Initiative and Innovation Platform “United Coordinating Hub”, public marathon #Why_Do_We_Need_to_Be_ Together?, in partnership with the Ministry for Temporarily Occupied Territories and the Verkhovna Rada Committee for Human Rights, National Minorities and Interethnic Relations and the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Switzerland, Finland and Germany.  The Platform is supported organizationally by СMI.