Kremlin comments on possibility of Barack Obama joining work of Normandy Four

MOSCOW, April 21. /TASS/. Kremlin would be glad if some country exerted influence on Kiev to make it implement the February 12 Minsk agreements, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday.

"If some country is ready and can influence Kiev to prompt it to implement Minsk-2, Moscow would naturally welcome it," Peskov told journalists.

"The key thing is to focus on implementation of the Minsk deals," he stressed.

Peskov recalled that "the work in the ‘Normandy format’ [Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine] has so far led to a plan of action, that is the Minsk agreements-2, being formulated and signed by relevant parties as a result of hard work."

"The signing of these Minsk agreements with their first point - cessation of fire - made it possible to stop horrible bloodshed and barbarous bombings of cities and inhabited localities in Ukraine’s southeast," the Kremlin spokesman said.

He said "the plan stipulates further steps that were to be implemented by sides who put their signatures on the security of the Normandy Four."

"Now we state with regret that there is a considerable stall in Kiev’s implementation of its commitments on Minsk-2, which certainly leaves the situation rather fragile, which can’t but cause our concerns," Peskov said.

He said "now it is of course necessary to first of all focus on implementation of all commitments taken by Kiev."

"They should be implemented in the sequence mentioned in the document signed by Kiev’s representatives," Peskov said.

This was the way Peskov answered a question on the possibility of US President Barack Obama joining the work of the Normandy Four. The possibility was voiced Tuesday by US Ambassador in Moscow John Tefft.