Russians are trying to 'eliminate' our country, says Ukrainian prime minister

Arseniy Yatsenyuk said that his nation stood in the path of Moscow's desire to reshape the global order

A Ukrainian army helicopter flies over their positions in Debaltsevo in the Donetsk region of Ukraine

Russia is striving to restore the Soviet Union and "eliminate" Ukraine, the country's prime minister declared today, exposing a rift within the Kiev government over the wisdom of a ceasefire agreement.

Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the Ukrainian prime minister, said that his nation stood in the path of Moscow's supposed ambition to topple the "global order" and rebuild the Soviet Union.

But the young and stridently nationalistic prime minister differed sharply from his superior, President Petro Poroshenko. The two men at the apex of Ukraine's government disagree over the ultimate questions of how to bring peace and how to deal with President Vladimir Putin.

Mr Poroshenko has allowed direct talks with Russia and the rebels who control the eastern cities of Donetsk and Luhansk.

The outcome was the Minsk ceasefire protocol of September 5, which the president hailed on Friday as an "optimistic" moment that could bring "peace and security".

Mr Yatsenyuk, by contrast, described the ceasefire agreement as merely a "pause" that would allow time to "regroup". He also opposed holding any bilateral negotiations with Russia, saying that America and the European Union should be present at any meeting to strengthen Ukraine's bargaining power.

The Ukrainian president must now grapple with the political challenge of implementing the Minsk agreement. In the process, he is likely to encounter the opposition of his ambitious prime minister.

Mr Yatsenyuk, 40, was a prime mover behind the popular revolution which toppled Ukraine's last government in February. After becoming prime minister, he co-founded a new pro-European party, the Popular Front, and now describes himself as being at the helm of a "wartime government".

Addressing a conference in Kiev today, Mr Yatsenyuk said: "Let me put it bluntly: we are still in a state of war and the key aggressor is the Russian Federation."

As for Mr Putin's objectives, the prime minister said: "His aim is not just to take Donetsk and Luhansk. His goal is to take the entire Ukraine. He cannot cope with an idea that Ukraine would be a part of the EU family. He wants to restore the Soviet Union."

Mr Yatsenyuk remembered how in 2007 Mr Putin described the Soviet Union's demise as the "biggest disaster of the last century". This showed that the "biggest success of President Putin would be the restoration of the Soviet Union".

Stage one of Mr Putin's plan for a new Russian Imperium had been the annexation of Crimea in March, said Mr Yatsenyuk. Stage two was the pro-Russian rebellion now taking place in eastern Ukraine.

Stage three would be for Russian troops to seize a "corridor" across Ukraine linking the rebel-held cities with the breakaway republic of Transnistria in Moldova. "In the fourth one, he wants to eliminate Ukraine as an independent country," added Mr Yatsenyuk.

Faced with this "aggressor", the prime minister argued that Ukraine should not hold any bilateral negotiations with the Kremlin. "We are not so strong to have bilateral talks and to get a bilateral deal with Russia," said Mr Yatsenyuk. "They will outplay us: that's what they expected, that's what they want to do."

Instead, he recalled a summit in Geneva five months ago when Ukraine's foreign minister met his Russian counterpart alongside the representatives of America and the EU, thereby strengthening Kiev's position. "The idea of having the peaceful solution is a valid one, but to execute and implement this idea we need to have sitting at the table the US and the EU. We need to get some guarantees," said Mr Yatsenyuk. "We need to have appropriate guarantees of Ukrainian sovereignty and independence."

Mr Poroshenko, by contrast, has met face-to-face with Mr Putin and allowed direct talks with the rebels. He views the resulting Minsk agreement as the route to peace. "All the time I am an optimist - and I strongly believe that we will have a positive result in this negotiation. That's why I so positively estimate our joint meeting in Minsk," said Mr Poroshenko on Friday.

But the prime minister contradicted this sanguine view on Saturday. Rather than being a step to a settlement, Mr Yatsenyuk said the "idea" of the Minsk agreement was to halt a "massacre" and "just to get a pause, to regroup". He added: "I would be happy to have peace in my country. But the question is the price for this peace."

The war in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk has claimed at least 3,000 lives since April. Last month, Russia sent at least 3,000 troops over the border into Ukraine, supported by tanks and heavy artillery, according to Nato. This intervention halted a Ukrainian military offensive and probably saved the rebels from defeat.

Mr Yatsenyuk's words suggest that he sees the ceasefire as a tactical manoeuvre to allow Ukraine's army a breathing space before it resumes a bid to retake the east by force.

The biggest concession that Mr Poroshenko made at Minsk concerned the future status of Donetsk and Luhansk. Point three of the ceasefire agreement obliges Kiev to pass a law giving both regions greater autonomy and a "special status" within Ukraine.

The necessary Bill will go before Ukraine's parliament this week. Many MPs will bitterly oppose this measure, fearing that it could be a prelude to the break-up of Ukraine.

However, Mr Poroshenko insisted that he had signed nothing that threatened the "territorial sovereign integrity of my country". One vital question will be whether Mr Yatsenyuk tacitly encourages a parliamentary rebellion against his own government's peace plan.

Mr Poroshenko argues that he has extracted key concessions from the Kremlin. In particular, the border between Ukraine and Russia is supposed to be monitored by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe in order to prevent Moscow from sending any more troops or weapons. In addition, all "illegal armed groups" should leave Ukraine.

Yet neither of these steps has been taken and the ceasefire has often been broken.

America and the EU tightened their sanctions on Friday, restricting the ability of Russian banks, energy and defence companies to raise funds.

German Gref, the president of Sberbank, the biggest Russian bank, admitted that these measures were having an impact even beyond the letter of the sanctions. "It's impossible to attract three-month and 30-day financing," he said. "The situation is now much worse than spelt out in the sanctions."

However, the fact that Russia's economy is under pressure will not reduce the controversy in Ukraine over the painful concessions made by Mr Poroshenko.

His chosen negotiator in Minsk was a former Ukrainian president, Leonid Kuchma, who served between 1994 and 2005.

Mr Kuchma, 76, offered a sense of how tense the talks had been. "Will I become part of history as a peacemaker or as someone who sat at the negotiating table with terrorists and separatists?" he asked. "The situation depends on two people: God and Putin. God doesn't exist, so that leaves Putin."

By David Blair