Poroshenko’s team explains reasons of the conflict with Right Sector

Ukraine’s Right Sector volunteer corps is refusing to fulfill the agreements on its integration into the country’s Armed Forces, presidential councilor and defense minister’s aide Yuri Birykov has announced today in his Facebook account commenting statements of Right Sector that Ukrainian Armed Forces are trying to disarm them.

“The time has come to comprehend that the army has grown and strengthened and it now should be a sole one, united and offensive. To get the task, the army should take in best guys in Ukraine. They must be the core and the cement INSIDE the army for the simple reason that the morale of conscripts leaves much to be desired. And a unit/troop/squadron/battalion of volunteers being inside a military unit is the best incentive than all political instructors and chaplains together,” Biryukov wrote.

“We finally came to understanding and agreed that unit will not be divided, and regular officers will become part of volunteer battalions’ headquarters. Moreover, we have found a solution and openly announced it – to make the army similar to the Estonian army reserve. After a month and a half of distant negotiations and adjustments we had a meeting, Dmitry Yarosh became advisor to Ukraine's Chief of General Staff. After that, some battalion commanders of Ukrainian volunteer corps, their deputies, chiefs of staff and their deputies started coming to the General Staff. The mood was worsening more and more, the rhetoric became more and more categorical, from both sides,” the defense minister’s aide stressed.

“I personally do not like that someone promises to join the Ukrainian Armed Forces and then breaks the promise; someone establishes numerous coordination centers, alternative headquarters, parallel structures; someone publicly states the intention to establish a new political force for the coming election that would have an armed wing. I do not understand it. It seemed to me that battalions are to fight, commanders are to command instead of becoming members of various parliaments,” Poroshenko’s advisor wrote.

Meanwhile, he refused to comment on events of recent hours around the base of Right Sector and noted he did not know who made what decision.

As EADaily reported earlier, on April 28, two Ukrainian Armed Forces units surrounded the base of Right Sector in the village of Velikomikhailovka in Dnipropetrovsk Region and urged the volunteers to surrender. In response, Right Sector refused to do it and said it was ready to fight back and hold the line.

Members of Right Sector are also having a protest action at the presidential administration building in Kiev. In case their claims are not heard, they promised to set the building on fire.