Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent discussions he has had with his EU counterparts about future relations with Ukraine.

The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond) attended the EU Foreign Affairs Council meeting on 17 November where EU Foreign Ministers reiterated their support for the Minsk Protocol and Minsk Memorandum and urged all parties to implement them swiftly. They once again underlined the Russian Federation's responsibility in this context. The EU welcomed the holding of parliamentary elections in Ukraine on 26 October and looked forward to the urgent formation of a new government. They called for an intensification of much needed political and economic reforms in Ukraine, including constitutional reform, decentralisation, reform of the judiciary, law enforcement, fight against corruption and ensuring the rights of persons belonging to national minorities. The EU underlined that a renewed inclusive, country-wide national dialogue on reforms will be important to consolidate Ukraine's unity and internal cohesion and called on all sides to work towards early local elections in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, in accordance with Ukrainian law, as foreseen in the Minsk Protocol, as the only legal and legitimate means of renewing the democratic mandate of the local authorities.

The EU considers the holding of "presidential and parliamentary elections" in Donetsk and Luhansk "People’s Republics" on 2 November as illegal and illegitimate and will not recognise them. The Foreign Affairs Council called on the European External Action Service and the European Commission to present a proposal for a decision by the end of November on additional listings targeting separatists.