OREANDA-NEWS. The United States headed for the freezing of the conflict in the south-east of Ukraine. This opinion was expressed by Alexei Chesnakov, director of the political conjuncture center, commenting on the Internet conference held on Tuesday by Special Representative of the State Department Kurt Walker.

“Judging by yesterday’s statements by Volcker, the United States headed for freezing the conflict in the south-east of Ukraine,” he said in an interview with a Russian media reporter. “Asserting that“ Ukraine can't do more for the implementation of the Minsk agreements than it has already done, ”he in fact, he urged Kiev to do nothing more to implement the UN resolution on Donbass. Thus, Volker's trying to freeze the peace process, and with it the conflict".

“Having supported the election of Petro Poroshenko,” Chesnakov continued, “Volker was clearly taken aback when his candidate suffered a complete fiasco. He’s worried because he doesn’t know Vladimir Zelensky badly and fears that the new president of Ukraine, being a populist, will listen to the opinion of the Ukrainian people and follow Minsk agreements".

“Volker needs a pause to put pressure on Zelensky and convince the people’s servant that his people are mistaken and that the war is actually good”, the Russian expert believes. “In order to confirm Washington’s disinterest in the settlement, the US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo didn’t raise the issue of Ukraine at all at the recent negotiations in Sochi".

Alexey Chesnakov also expressed surprise at the fact that Volker had information that a meeting in the "Norman format" was supposedly possible in July. “Experts and representatives of the leaders of the Norman Quartet, of course, are constantly in contact, their meetings or telephone conferences are possible,” he said. “But holding the summit in July, in the complete absence of positive steps from Kiev, seems incredible to me”.