You're reading: Kuchma says Western economic sanctions against Russia aren’t working fast enough

ZHYTOMYR - Ukrainian representative in the Trilateral Contact Group, member of the Constitutional Commission, the second President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma has said that western sanctions against Russia aimed at achieving peace in Ukraine aren't working fast enough.

“I have already said and want to repeat once again: the peace in Ukraine depends on God and Putin [Russian President Vladimir Putin]. God is far away, and Putin isn’t close either. Those actions by the EU together with the Americans – I’m talking about trade sanctions – influence economic problems in Russia,” he told journalists in Zhytomyr on June 25.

However, Kuchma said that “until a plump one loses weight, we, lean Ukrainians, might cease to exist. That’s why it’s the main problem.”