Lawmakers of the Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian Parliament, initiated debates, which turned into a scuffle in the session hall. It started on Thursday afternoon, as the MPs considered the draft law on re-integration of Donbas.
The reason for the scuffle was that the document – specifically, Article 7, – contained mentions about Minsk agreement, which is supposed to solve Donbas conflict; certain political forces, such as Svoboda party and Radical party, protest against including this mechanism in the document.
Meanwhile, law enforcers boosted security measures and reinforced the guard in the governmental quarter, including the building of the Parliament.
Chronology:
16:13 Rada starts discussion on the Donbas reintegration draft law.
16:46 Lawmakers from Samopomich party initiate a rustle in the session hall of the Ukrainian Parliament. They blocked the parliamentary podium. Break in the session announced.
17:34 Leader of the Radical Party Oleh Lyashko says that MPs agreed to remove any mentions of the Minsk agreements from the bill.
17:48 Head of National Security and Defence Council Turchynov said that the draft has the strategic importance for Ukraine. He added that the MPs have to ratify the law today.
18:16 Speaker of the Parliament closed the session. The Dobas reintegration bill hasn't been adopted. The speaker noted that even though the mention of the the Minsk agreements had been removed from the bill, the MPs didn't unblock the podium. The discussion of the draft law is to continue tomorrow.
