Grigory Yavlinsky supported the proposal made by Russian President Vladimir Putin to cancel the decision of the Federation Council «to use the armed forces of the Russian Federation on the territory of Ukraine» and expressed cautious optimism in this respect. Yavlinsky noted that this decision would become a good prologue to an international conference on the resolution of the conflict offered by the State Duma Speaker Sergei Naryshkin a day before.

Journalists in the Interfax North-West Press Centre asked Yavlinsky about the role of an international conference in the resolution of the situation in Ukraine. The idea of such a conference was proposed by Grigory Yavlinsky expressed in early March. On June 23, Sergei Naryshkin, Speaker of the State Duma, offered to hold such a conference.

«We are pleased that the initiative proposed by us three or four months ago could turn into a state initiative, if it is supported on the top level. I think that Sergei Naryshkin could not offer it without a direct order of the President. They simply do not do such unsanctioned things there,» Yavlinsky said. According to him, this may indicate that the government was looking for mechanisms to resolve the situation.

«I would like to reiterate that the configuration of this conference proposed by us, and its participants have not become less urgent and all this can be done. This will certainly lead to a substantial improvement in the situation,» he noted.

Grigory Yavlinsky stressed that YABLOKO had been assessing the developments in the South-East Ukraine as a terrible tragedy. According to him, Russia bore responsibility for what had happened there.