MINSK, September 4 (RIA Novosti) – A meeting of the Contact Group on Ukrainian reconciliation will take place at the President Hotel in the Belarusian capital Minsk at 10:00 GMT on Friday, a representative from the Foreign Ministry of Belarus told RIA Novosti Thursday.
“The press is invited to arrive at the President Hotel at 1 p.m. local time [10:00 GMT],” the representative said.
Earlier on Thursday the Luhansk and Donetsk people’s republics said they were ready to give ceasefire orders on Friday, September 5. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said he would be able to give the same order on Friday starting from 2 p.m. local time (11:00 GMT), provided the Minsk meeting takes place.
Poroshenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the first steps to be taken to bring an end to the bloodshed in southeastern Ukraine over the telephone on Wednesday. According to the Kremlin, the views of the leaders on the issue were aligned.
The previous meeting of the Contact Group on Ukrainian reconciliation, comprising Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Ukrainian government and eastern Ukraine’s independence supporters, took place in Minsk on September 1.
Representatives from the Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics said during the meeting that if the self-proclaimed republics received certain legislative guarantees of their special status, they would make every effort to “save the single economic, cultural and political space of Ukraine and the whole space of the RussianUkrainian civilization."
