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Amanpour

Agreement to Cease Fire in Ukraine; Imagine a World

Aired February 12, 2015 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN HOST (voice-over): Tonight: signed, sealed, but will it deliver? Reaction from Ukraine and Russia to the latest peace

deal.

Also ahead: Yemen is collapsing before our eyes. That from the U.N. secretary-general today, with the U.S. embassy in Sanaa now shuttered,

where does that leave Washington's eyes and ears on the ground?

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AMANPOUR: Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the program. I'm Christiane Amanpour.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the French President Francois Hollande left Minsk today all smiles about the cease-fire they're

negotiated after 16 hours of meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. Both of them agreed to stop

fighting at midnight February 15th and to withdraw heavy weaponry within 14 days of the cease-fire.

They've also agreed on a prisoner exchange and amnesty for those who've been fighting in the Eastern Donbas region of Ukraine.

But since an almost identical agreement was signed in September and immediately broken, the question is whether the world could trickle down in

time to these separatist fighters who our team met on the front lines today and found them very much geared up to fight on.

In just a moment, we'll be speaking live to Ukraine's ambassador to the United Nations, Yuriy Sergeyev, who's standing by in New York.

But first, Russia's ambassador to the OSCE, that organization will be monitoring the withdrawal and Andrey Kelin joined me a little earlier from

headquarters in Vienna.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR: Ambassador Kelin, welcome to the program.

ANDREY KELIN, RUSSIAN AMBASSADOR TO OSCE: Thank you very much, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: So another deal has been reached and many people calling it a last-ditch attempt for a diplomatic resolution.

Do you think that the conditions that have been signed onto lead to a permanent cease-fire?

Do you have hope, in other words?

KELIN: Yes, I do. And this is a short answer and there are reasons for it. This agreement addresses the core matter. And the core matter is

a political settlement. It is in a very detailed way, he is talking what should be done in order to establish dialogue between Kiev authorities and

the authorities of Luhansk and Donetsk Republic.

If it all be in place, then we can see that we shall get our settlement that is supported by political settlement. And this is a key to

success here.

AMANPOUR: Can you explain to me the lines that are in question right now?

We understand that the Ukrainian forces have to pull back to a certain line; the separatists to a certain line, which was the line of September

19th.

What happens to the territory in between?

KELIN: Christiane, there are perhaps too many talks about this line. In the first place, this is not a border and not a boundary. It is just a

line from which you count a certainly number of kilometers for which you have to withdraw heavy weapons and missiles.

And no one would like, especially us, especially Russia, to turn this line into the border. It should not exist. We support the territorial

integrity of the Ukraine.

As for the line, yes, it has slightly changed during a recent time, after the 19th of September, after first Minsk agreement has been reached.

It's a strip 10 kilometers wide and 50 kilometers -- 10 kilometers long, 50 kilometers wide.

AMANPOUR: Obviously, that means Ukraine's international border with Russia -- that is also part of this agreement. We've seen how that has

been porous, to say the least, over the last year.

Do you think that Ukraine can count on having its border back?

KELIN: Before we will come to the practical realization of the control, reestablishment of control over the border, we should first define

what are they going to guard?

It means that there should be a law adopted in Kiev on the status of these republics of Donbas, as such.

AMANPOUR: What you're saying is because the ambassador --

KELIN: I'm talking about exactly your question.

AMANPOUR: -- yes, but I guess I'm reading into you a little woolliness about an established international border.

And my simple question is, will that established international border remain as such, as it has been outlined in the agreement?

KELIN: I tried to explain what should be done. If you will not have the status of these territories, if you will not have an amnesty for these

people, then these people will be always fear that there is an attempt to encircle them from all sides and then just to crash, just to serve the

terror on this terrain.

If they will be protected by the status law and amnesty law, it's a different thing. Then they will agree and I'm sure it is already their

attempts, they will agree to allow --will control of the border from the inside or outside, it doesn't matter.

You will see that there is a clear linkage between the political status of these republics and a control of the border.

AMANPOUR: But the agreement specifically says that the international border will be monitored by Ukrainian border guards or whatever you want to

call them, but it's a Ukrainian border.

KELIN: Exactly. With consent, as it is said, of these republics

AMANPOUR: So is this the end of this terrible war?

KELIN: I hope so.

(LAUGHTER)

KELIN: We've spent so many time and energy in it. It was difficult, really. And I really hope that, first, we shall have a cease-fire in the

coming 48 hours. Then there will be a development of a dialogue and the political settlement.

And Kiev will find -- will, in the end of the day, will talk to the leaders of Lugansk and Donetsk and this, if out of this conversation we

shall get a constitutional reform and a certain degree of autonomy for Lugansk and Donetsk and the protection of the right of their citizens to

speak a language they choose and to have economic ties, they would like to have, and actually some money at their disposal.

So these are the necessary preconditions for a final settlement.

AMANPOUR: Ambassador Kelin, thank you very much indeed for joining us.

KELIN: OK. Thank you.

Thank you for the questions.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR: Now when he faced the media after the negotiating marathon, Ukraine's president was clearly tired and wary.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETRO POROSHENKO, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT: It was very difficult negotiation. We expect not easy implementation process.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: And so joining me now from the United Nations in New York is the Ukrainian ambassador, Yuriy Sergeyev.

Ambassador, welcome back to the program. We spoke earlier this week before this deal was achieved. And you had said that your hope was

restrained, your optimism was restrained.

Are you now optimistic about this deal that has been sealed today?

YURIY SERGEYEV, UKRAINIAN AMBASSADOR TO THE U.N.: Thank you, having me back. The results of Minsk very promising. But we have these positive

signs in September, nothing happened after that.

So that's why I propose to wait until Sunday morning and to see how the sides are implementing what they agreed. And then I will be ready to

tell if I am still optimist or I will be reserved as my president told that we would have a long process of implementation.

(CROSSTALK)

SERGEYEV: Implementation is very important.

AMANPOUR: Indeed. And what was signed in Minsk with your president and with the international leaders as well. Do you think Ukraine got a

good deal on paper?

And is it very similar or identical to what you got in September?

SERGEYEV: Well, so any negotiations are based on the compromise. What is not compromised and it was openly stated in Minsk that our

territorial integrity and constitutional order will remain. It means that Ukraine will remain to be unitarian state and the borders will remain as

they are recognized by international community, include Russian Federation.

AMANPOUR: So there -- what you -- let me just interrupt you on that special and important point, because you heard my interview with Ambassador

Kelin of the OSCE. He said yes, but, in other words yes, you get the international border back but first you have to agree to all sorts of

things that are written down for that region, more autonomy, the language issue, elections, you know, constitutional reform.

SERGEYEV: This is the rhetoric of the Russian side only. And they try to bring it to the negotiations in Minsk. But it is clearly -- was

clearly written in Minsk that no autonomy, no federal republics, but the special status with this internalization power and we keep standing on the

same position.

So --

AMANPOUR: So you're prepared. So --

(CROSSTALK)

AMANPOUR: -- yes, you're prepared for the special status and I believe some constitutional reform, correct?

SERGEYEV: Yes, sure. So we declared the readiness to have our disinternalization (ph) plans to be implemented, not only towards the

eastern part of Ukraine but throughout Ukraine. So this is our intention to do.

AMANPOUR: OK, now --

SERGEYEV: So that's why.

AMANPOUR: -- the IMF has also, as these talks were going on, injected a huge amount of money into the Ukrainian coffers.

How will that help you?

Obviously it's desperately required.

SERGEYEV: Yes, it is helpful and they are preferring to have this support by the end of this month. So this is -- this is very promising and

very much needed.

AMANPOUR: And do you think, as President Putin said -- and, again, you heard Ambassador Kelin say -- that the long-term objective is for the

Kiev government to establish a dialogue and a relationship with the leaders of the Donbas region, of Luhansk and Donetsk.

Is that going to happen?

SERGEYEV: What our leadership used to tell and keep telling that leave us alone with our own citizens, whoever they are. And you would find

the common language. But for that, Russians should move out their forces and themselves from the region.

And not to support separatists and to make our dialogue more complicated. This is the position, to leave us alone, to decide what we

want to build within Ukraine and what our destiny should be. It is exactly what we are hoping to do with the -- our people on the east of Ukraine.

AMANPOUR: All right. Well, we shall see, 48 hours this is meant to come into effect.

Ambassador Sergeyev, thank you for joining me.

And after a break, we ask how do you conduct diplomacy when you close your embassy? As the United States has just done in Yemen. But first,

another note from Russia. President Putin's well-known crackdown on Russia's gay population has caused many of them to flee the country, to go

underground.

But look at what picture won this year's World Press Photo Award: we leave you with it, a moment of intimacy, some brief tranquility for a gay

couple at home in St. Petersburg.

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AMANPOUR: Welcome back to the program.

Now they are iconic images, the last helicopter load of Americans scrambling out of Saigon as the North Vietnamese Communists declared

victory in April 1975. And four years later, this in Tehran, blindfolded American diplomats having to surrender their embassy to Iranian

revolutionaries and then spending 444 days as hostages there.

And of course it's not just evacuating a building; it's losing a vital foothold. It's a defeat with a real impact on policy in that crucial

region now America has long been without embassies in Iran and Somalia and this week it added Yemen to the list of diplomatic closures that already

included Libya and Syria.

And joining me now from Washington is in fact the last American ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford.

Ambassador, welcome. This is obviously a serious issue. There are so many world changing events happening in that part of the world and the U.S.

is without the vital tools of diplomacy and change.

What has it meant for instance in Syria not to have an embassy?

ROBERT FORD, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO SYRIA: Well, this is a very tough situation. People at the embassies involved and in Washington, the

State Department, the White House, Pentagon, have to weigh security and personnel versus the advantages of having an embassy on the ground. And of

course having an embassy on the ground, having a staff, a competent, professional staff, enables you to have direct contacts with a variety of

people, not just government leaders but people in the military, people in civil society, people in the media, people who are movers and shakers in a

society which, in many cases, such as Syria in 2011-12 or in Yemen now, societies that are trembling and where we have direct interests, in many

cases security interests.

AMANPOUR: There were many reasons why the U.S. shut down the embassy in Syria. There was violence; there was sort of attacks against yourself

and the embassy, et cetera.

In Yemen, many people are saying and asking, why did the U.S. close the embassy in Sanaa because actually there has been much more violence and

instability and the U.S. stayed there.

What is it about the takeover by the Houthi rebels that has caused the U.S. to do this?

Can you explain?

FORD: Well, I'm not an expert on Yemen, Christiane. But I do know, having worked in embassies in very high threat places such as Algeria, Iraq

and Syria, that security weighs most heavily of all on these decisions. The security of our personnel outweighs all other considerations. And so I

am sure that even if Sanaa had a perhaps enjoyed a brief lull in fighting, there had been direct attacks repeatedly against the American embassy in

Sanaa. And of course I think one of the things which particularly made an impression on people evaluating the security circumstances was the ambush

of an American embassy vehicle some weeks ago, in which embassy vehicles took automatic weapons fire. Happily, the vehicles were armored and none

of the rounds penetrated and killed or wounded any of the personnel.

But it was a close call. And so in a situation like Sanaa, where you're not sure of security is going to keep improving or if you're just

enjoying a brief lull, then you have to decide should you take advantage of that brief lull and get your people out.

AMANPOUR: So now, though, the question of the impact, because people have gone. And this was one of the main key bases over a number of years

for the United States to tackle Al Qaeda; it's one of the most vicious hotbeds of Al Qaeda today.

What does that mean for the policy?

I know you're not an expert on Yemen, but what does that mean for the policy, do you think?

FORD: Well, it's absolutely going to be harder to implement. There's no question. There's an article today in "The Washington Post" talking

about how the CIA will have to scale down some of its operations.

But the same "Washington Post" article highlights that U.S. special forces will retain some presence in the country and so that's good. And

really, Christiane, when this kind of thing happens, when you lose your embassy in a country, you have to get more creative. So let me give you an

example.

We'll have to work, I think, more with regional partners; for example, the Saudi Arabians have a long experience dealing with Yemen. So we'll

have to probably increase our coordination with the Saudis.

They will certainly know things that we don't. Some of the analysis that was done inside the embassy perhaps can be relocated to a safer

location, perhaps not so far from Yemen; it may be even in the same time zone. So that'll help.

Of course so much of diplomacy, Christiane, is about relationships and personal contact. It's going to be a lot harder without an embassy. But

there are telephones and it's not a perfect substitute, not a perfect substitute but you have to do what you have to do.

AMANPOUR: Right. Now that would be understandable and I understand what you're saying if there was just one embassy closed. But we've just

had a map showing all these embassies in this vital region closed.

So that has a multiplying effect, doesn't it?

FORD: Well, I don't know if it's a multiplying effect, but it -- you might say it's a cumulative effect. But in each of these cases, security

is of paramount concern. I don't need to remind you about Libya and what happened to our diplomats there.

We're just going to have to find creative workarounds and that is not easy to do. I don't mean to diminish the difficulty. I just think we have

professional people, very well trained, very capable and let's empower them to figure out those workarounds.

AMANPOUR: All right. Ambassador Ford, thank you very much for joining us from Washington.

FORD: My pleasure.

AMANPOUR: And just a note, we did ask for a representative from the State Department to discuss this decision to close the embassy in Sanaa but

they declined.

This past year has been a disaster for the free press, in Yemen and around the world. As a new report from World Press Freedom Index shows a

decline in press independence and reporter safety. But there are glimmers of hope.

Countries like Mongolia, for instance, have risen up the index due to new legislation protecting their free media. And Tonga in Polynesia,

imagine that, also rose after establishing an independent press to hold the government to account.

After a break, we turn to the American press and we remember the long- time foreign correspondent Bob Simon. Imagining a man who chased stories across continents.

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AMANPOUR: And finally tonight, we take a moment to celebrate the life and achievement of Bob Simon, the veteran American war correspondent who

was killed in a car accident in New York last night.

He was 73 years old and he leaves behind his wife, his daughter, his grandchild and his nation full of people who now know more about their

world because of his reporting.

In a storied career, Bob Simon's front line positions took him from the Vietnam War to the major events of the last 50 years when the last U.S.

helicopters took flight from Saigon, as we mentioned earlier. He was on one of them. And CBS News today paid tribute to their star reporter.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Fighting foreign correspondent Bob Simon cut a striking figure. His assignments, thousands of them, took him

to far-flung corners of the Earth. But it all began in Vietnam.

BOB SIMON, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: We're going to pick up an American. All we know about him is that he's had fire at base Andrews and

that he's been hit by shrapnel.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): A war Simon covered for much of the 1970s, he was on one of the last American helicopters out of Saigon.

SIMON: President Assad's tough statement, warning Israel against military intervention, was not taken at face value in Jerusalem.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Simon was named chief Middle East correspondent for CBS in 1987, reporting on conflict in the region for over

20 years. He witnessed Egyptian President Anwar Sadat's first visit to Jerusalem.

SIMON: Will miracles never cease?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): -- covered Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's assassination.

SIMON: Sadness beyond words.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): -- and during the intifada, he and his crew captured a brutal beating of two Palestinian teens with the use of

a telephoto lens. It was a powerful image of the conflict.

SIMON: This seemed cold, deliberate, methodical. It went on for 40 minutes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Never one to shy away from war zones, Simon covered the opening days of the Gulf War in 1991. But he ended up

being part of the story when Iraqi forces captured him and his three-man crew.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR: Now that experience he detailed in his book, "Forty Days," the number of days and nights that he and his colleagues were held. And so

surely Bob Simon would have been delighted to hear today's news, that the journalist, Mohamed Fahmy and Baher Mohammad have been released after more

than 400 days in an Egyptian prison. They're on bail, but out of jail, having been in prison for practicing the profession that Bob Simon did to

such a great degree and loved so much.

That is it for our program tonight. Remember you can always see the whole show online at amanpour.com, and follow me on Facebook and Twitter.

Thank you for watching and goodbye from London.

END