Ukraine summit agrees ceasefire, withdrawal of weapons: Putin

MINSK: Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that he and the leaders of France, Germany and Ukraine had agreed on the withdrawal of heavy weapons from Ukraine’s frontlines and a ceasefire to begin from February 15.
“We have managed to agree on the main things,” a visibly pleased Putin told reporters in Minsk after marathon talks that began Wednesday evening. “We have agreed on a cease-fire,” he said but stressed that Kiev was still unwilling to directly negotiate with rebels. However, details remained unclear after more than 12 hours of peace talks in the Belarus capital Minsk.
But the document, whi-ch may be a joint declara-tion rather than a full agree-ment, may be signed by lower level envoys rather than by the leaders thems-elves, the sources said. The sources said any agreem-ent would however be sent to a “contact group” which includes representatives of the pro-Russian rebels, whose involvement could be crucial.
The discussions came as pro-Moscow separatists tightened the pressure on Kiev by launching some of the war’s worst fighting on Wednesday, killing 19 Ukrainian soldiers in assaults near the railway town of Debaltseve.
Fighting has already killed more than 5,000 people, and Washington is now openly talking of arming Ukraine to defend itself from “Russian aggression”, raising the prospect of a proxy war in the heart of Europe between Cold War foes.
The summit was held in neighbouring Belarus under a Franco-German proposal to try to halt the fighting in eastern Ukraine.
Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Fran-cois Hollande joined Ukrai-ne’s Petro Poros-henko and Russia’s Vladi-mir Putin for a longer-than-expected meeting that began early on Wednesday evening and continued well into Thursday morning.(AP)