MOSCOW, October 15 (RIA Novosti) - Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said Wednesday his forthcoming Milan meeting with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, was brought up in a phone conference with European leaders.
"The European side asked for a telephone conference to be held on the preparations ahead of the extremely important meeting in Milan tomorrow, where European and EU leaders, together with me, the President of Ukraine, will convene for extremely important talks with the leadership of the Russian Federation, focusing on the extremely important issue of peace in Ukraine, the peace settlement, political process, and de-escalation in the country's east," Poroshenko said, adding the world had "high hopes for tomorrow."
Putin and Poroshenko are to meet on the sidelines of the October 16-17 Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) forum. ASEM is an informal trans-regional platform for dialogue and cooperation between the two regions.
The last meeting between Putin and Poroshenko took place in the Belarusian capital of Minsk on August 26 at talks that also involved heads of Russia's Customs Union partner nations Belarus and Kazakhstan, along with EU officials.
In April, Kiev forces started a military operation against independence supporters in eastern Ukraine, which according to UN figures claimed the lives of over 3,660 people and left over 8,700 injured.
In early September, two meetings of the Contact Group on Ukraine – Russia, Ukraine, the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk people's republics and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) – resulted in a ceasefire agreement and a nine-point memorandum that specified the implementation of the truce between Kiev and southeastern Ukraine's militias.
