Arseniy Yatsenyuk: A key task is peace within the country which must be ensured through taking certain political and diplomatic measures

“We shall never leave the road that envisages unity of the country, decentralizing of power, making amendments to the Constitution, election of the new legitimate President and European integration of Ukraine,” the Prime Minister said during the First nation-wide roundtable of national unity in Kyiv on Wednesday, May 14.

“There is an extremely hard historical task in front of us – to preserve peace in Ukraine, preserve Ukraine as a united, indivisible country, secure a right to live decently for each person in our state,” he said. 

According to Arseniy Yatsenyuk, “it is difficult to recall a more dramatic period when we faced such challenges”: “Launch of the nation dialog is of great significance, as we bear responsibility for the fate of the entire country, which is the home for 45-million people and situated in the center of Europe”.

The Head of Government stressed a key task is peace within the state which “can be and must be ensured through taking certain political and diplomatic measures”: “We shall negotiate with everyone who isn’t holding weapon in hands, who isn’t shooting or killing innocent citizens, but who is working exceptionally to achieve the unity of Ukrainian state”.

The Government of Ukraine, the Prime Minister stressed, is ready to fulfill the tasks elaborated in the course of this nation-wide roundtable of unity: “Now the first goal is human security. People are afraid to go outside, communicate to each other, frightened for their future, for their family, relatives, the country and for what will be tomorrow”.

According to him, the solution to it is not just through a law enforcement system reforming, that is another key task for the Government, “but through communication and a dialog in which Kyiv will hear Donetsk, Donetsk will hear Lviv, but the entire country should not just listen, but to pay attention to each other’s words”: “We should fulfill this task together”.

Arseniy Yatsenyuk emphasized among other issues capable to ensure unity the country are combating corruption and providing with workplaces. He told that while visiting a checkpoint of one of ATO [anti-terrorist operation] areas near Slovyansk he had communicated to the family members who had been leaving Slovyansk for Kharkiv: “They didn’t raise a language problem, we were talking Russian. They didn’t raise problems which are often raised inside Ukraine’s Parliament. They just said: We don’t want everything go on the same way as before; we wish there wasn’t corruption, we wish you to tell us how we can obtain high quality education, where we shall work and we don’t want to be afraid to go outside”.