A Ukrainian policeman removes a weapon found in Sloviansk, Donetsk region, on Tuesday
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said he is hoping for a peace agreement to be reached between Ukraine and pro-Russian rebels by Friday.
Mr Putin urged both sides to stop military action in eastern Ukraine, adding that his views and those of his Ukrainian counterpart were very close.
Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko said they had agreed a "ceasefire process".
Meanwhile US President Barack Obama said Nato guaranteed the independence of its members the Baltic states.
"You've lost your independence once before, with Nato you'll never lose it again," Mr Obama said in the Estonian capital Tallinn.
He told his audience of US and Estonian military that their countries were stronger because they were democracies, but that their vision was threatened by "Russia's aggression against Ukraine".
He said that there were "provable facts" that Russian combat forces were on the ground in Ukraine.
"Nations have a right to determine their own future. This is why we stand with the people of Ukraine today," he said.
He added that Nato had to send an "unmistakeable message in support of Ukraine this week", as well as strengthening the defences of two other former Soviet republics, Georgia and Moldova.
A Nato summit opens in Wales on Thursday. It is expected to back plans for a rapid response force and bolster the alliance's presence in eastern Europe.
In other developments
- Russia confirmed the death of journalist Andrei Stenin in Ukraine on 6 August, saying he had been killed in a Ukrainian government ambush on a convoy of rebels and refugees near Donetsk
- Russia is to hold military exercises in the south Siberian region of Altai this month involving more than 4,000 troops and air power, a defence ministry official told a Russian news agency
Speaking to journalists in the Mongolia capital Ulan Bator, Mr Putin said the two sides should reach agreement when they resumed talks in Minsk on Friday.
"Our views on the way to resolve the conflict, as it seemed to me, are very close," he said, referring to a phone conversation with Mr Poroshenko.
US President Barack Obama reassured Estonian President Toomas Hendrik (right) in Tallinn that his country had Nato's support
Russian President Vladimir Putin (right) was visiting Mongolia on Wednesday
He said he was proposing a seven-point peace plan:
- The Ukrainian army and eastern rebels should stop "active offensive operations"
- Ukrainian troops must pull back to a distance where they would be unable to shell population centres
- International monitoring of the ceasefire
- No use of military jets against civilians
- "All-for-all" prisoner exchange without preconditions
- Humanitarian corridor for refugees and to deliver aid
- Restoration of destroyed infrastructure.
Mr Poroshenko's office initially reported that a "permanent ceasefire" had been agreed but later revised its statement.
The earlier version of the statement on the Ukrainian presidential website read: "Their conversation resulted in agreement on a permanent ceasefire in the Donbass region [the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk]."
This has now been changed to: "Their conversation resulted in agreement on a process for ceasing fire in the Donbass region."
The statement adds that the two presidents "reached a mutual understanding on steps leading to peace".
In its statement (in Russian), the Kremlin said a phone conversation had taken place on Wednesday between the two presidents in which their points of view had "coincided significantly" on possible ways to end the crisis.
Mr Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, clarified for Russian news agency Ria-Novosti: "Putin and Poroshenko did not agree a ceasefire in Ukraine because Russia is not party to the conflict, they only discussed how to settle the conflict."
Russian photographer Andrei Stenin is seen here in Damascus in 2013
- At least 2,593 people killed since mid-April (not including 298 passengers and crew of Malaysian Airlines MH17, shot down in the area) - UN report on 29 August
- 951 civilians killed in Donetsk region alone, official regional authorities said on 20 August
- In some particularly dangerous places, such as Luhansk region, victims are said to have been buried informally, making accurate counts difficult
- Rebels (and some military sources) accuse the government of concealing true numbers
- 260,000 people have fled elsewhere in Ukraine while at least 814,000 have gone to Russia.
An aide to the deputy prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, Andrei Purgin, told the same agency that President Poroshenko had not consulted the rebels about any ceasefire and its announcement had come as a "complete surprise".
Vladislav Brig, a rebel official, told The Associated Press: "As long as Ukrainian forces are on the territory of the Donetsk People's Republic there can be no ceasefire."
A spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said that work on new sanctions against Russia was continuing because the ceasefire had not been confirmed.
Meanwhile a Ukrainian official in Zaporizhzhya region, west of the combat zone, said the bodies of 87 soldiers and pro-government volunteers killed in a controversial incident near the town of Ilovaysk several days ago had been brought to a local morgue.
The Ukrainian military says troops were fired on by rebels on Sunday after they had apparently been given safe passage out of an encirclement during rapid rebel advances. No-one has been able to confirm the circumstances of the killings or the total number of dead.
More than 2,600 civilians and combatants have been killed and more than a million people have fled their homes since fighting erupted in eastern Ukraine in April, when pro-Russian separatists there declared independence.
Russia has denied accusations by the West and the Ukrainian government that it is sending troops and military equipment over the border to support the separatists, who recently gained the upper hand against government forces.
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment