PARIS — French
President
Emmanuel Macron and Russian leader Vladimir Putin on Sunday agreed to
work for a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, Macron's office said.
اضافة اعلان
In a phone conversation lasting 105 minutes,
they also agreed on "the need to favor a diplomatic solution to the
ongoing crisis and to do everything to achieve one", the Elysee said,
adding that French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and his Russian counterpart
Sergei Lavrov would meet "in the coming days".
Russian agencies later reported out of
Moscow that both ministers would speak on Monday.
Putin and Macron said they would work
"intensely" to allow the Trilateral Contact Group, which includes
Ukraine, Russia, and the
OSCE, to meet "in the next few hours with the aim
of getting all interested parties to commit to a ceasefire at the contact
line" in eastern Ukraine where government troops and pro-Russian
separatists are facing each other.
"Intense diplomatic work will take
place in the coming days," Macron's office said, with several
consultations to take place in the French capital.
Macron and Putin also agreed that talks
between Russia, Ukraine, France, and Germany should resume to implement the
so-called Minsk protocol, which in 2014 had already called for a ceasefire in
eastern Ukraine.
Both also agreed to work towards "a
high-level meeting with the aim of defining a new peace and security order in
Europe", Macron's office said.
Macron, German Chancellor
Olaf Scholz and US
President Joe Biden would now consult on the Ukraine crisis "within
hours", Macron's office said.
The French president may also exchange with
British Prime Minister
Boris Johnson, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi and
"other close partners", it added.
In Sunday's call, Putin told Macron that he
intends to withdraw Russian troops from Belarus as soon as ongoing military
exercises there are over, the Elysee also said.
The French presidency said that this claim
"will have to be verified", adding it appeared to contradict a
statement by the Belarusian government that the Russian military would
"continue inspections" beyond Sunday's previously announced end of
the exercises, leaving
Moscow with a large force near the northern Ukraine border.
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