"F**k the EU," Victoria Nuland allegedly said in a recent phone call with US ambassador to Kiev Geoffrey Pyatt, as the two were discussing a deal to end the crisis in Ukraine.
The four-minute video - titled ‘Maidan puppets,’ referring to Independence Square in Ukraine’s capital - was uploaded by an anonymous user. The origin of the recording is not clear. The video was first reported in the Kyiv Post.
The conversation is mainly focused on Ukraine’s government and President Viktor Yanukovich's offer last month to make opposition leader Arseniy Yatsenyuk the new prime minister and Vitaly Klitschko deputy prime minister.
“I don’t think that Klitschko should go into the government. I don’t think it is necessary. I don’t think it is a good idea,” a female voice - allegedly Nuland - said.
“In terms of him not going into the government, just let him stay out and do his political homework,” a male voice - believed to be Pyatt - replied. “In terms of the process moving ahead, we want to keep the moderate democrats together,” he said.
As Nuland sees it, Ukrainian opposition leader Arseniy Yatsenyuk should be in charge of the new government and Klitschko would not get along with him. “It’s just not going to work,” she said.
Nuland added that she has also been told that UN chief Ban Ki-moon is about to appoint the former Dutch ambassador to Kiev, Robert Serry, as his representative to Ukraine.
"That would be great I think to help glue this thing and have the UN glue it and you know, f**k the EU," she said in apparent reference to their differences over policies.
"We've got to do something to make it stick together, because you can be pretty sure that if it does start to gain altitude the Russians will be working behind the scenes to try to torpedo it," Pyatt replied.
The State Department did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment. At the same time, White House spokesman Jay Carney alleged that the fact that it had been "tweeted out by the Russian government, it says something about Russia's role,” the news agency reported.
US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki declined to confirm the tape’s contents, but did not deny its authenticity.
"I did not say it was not authentic," she said, adding that Nuland had apologized to her EU counterparts for the reported comments.
source: RT
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