German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron made a joint statement about the Ukrainian sailors arrested before January 25, who are in jail in Moscow. The heads of state demanded Russia to liberate immediately “all illegally detained Ukrainian sailors” without any conditions.

“They should also be able to celebrate the upcoming holidays with their families,” the statement said.

Merkel and Macron also demanded to ensure the smooth passage of ships through the Kerch Strait. They stated that they intend to continue working towards the implementation of the Minsk agreements, and welcomed the agreement on the New Year’s truce in the Donbas.

We will remind, on November 25 FSB of Russia reported that frontier guards used the weapon against the Ukrainian warships “Berdyansk”, “Nikopol” and “Yana Kapu”, which allegedly violated frontier of the Russian Federation. Kiev called it an act of aggression, Moscow-a violation of the border.

As a result, 24 Ukrainian sailors were detained and later arrested until January 25. The Ukrainian side declared an act of aggression on the part of Russia, which in turn calls the incident a provocation. In Ukraine, after the incident martial law was imposed for 30 days.