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Ukraine and Rebel Delegates Say Cease-Fire Begins Today Fighting Tapers Off in Ukraine as Cease-Fire Takes Effect
(35 minutes later)
KIEV, Ukraine — Ukrainian government forces and the pro-Russian separatist rebels fighting them in eastern Ukraine will observe a cease-fire starting on Friday, negotiators from all sides announced at a news conference in Minsk, Belarus. KIEV, Ukraine — Government forces and the Russian-backed separatist rebels fighting in southeastern Ukraine will observe a cease-fire starting Friday, negotiators from all sides announced at a news conference in Minsk, Belarus.
The strength of the truce, however, was called into question by continued fighting around Mariupol, a port city in southeastern Ukraine, in the hours before it was to take effect. Speaking from Minsk, negotiators representing the Ukrainian government, the separatists, Russia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said that the cease-fire would come into force at 6 p.m. local time, or 11 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time.
Speaking from Minsk, negotiators representing the Ukrainian government, the separatists, Russia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said the cease-fire would come into force at 6 p.m. local time (11 a.m. Eastern time). As the truce went into effect, fighting that had raged throughout the day around the strategic port city of Mariupol tapered off, and Ukrainian soldiers could be seen pulling back to their bases. But in interviews, the troops said they had not yet received orders to stand down.
“The whole world is striving for peace. The whole of Ukraine is striving for peace, including millions of citizens in Donbass,” President Petro O. Poroshenko of Ukraine said in a statement on his official website confirming the agreement, referring to the region where the separatist strongholds are. “The highest value is human life, and we must do everything possible to stop the bloodshed and put an end to suffering.” At a news conference at a NATO summit meeting in Wales, President Obama said he was “hopeful but, based on past experience, also skeptical” about the prospects of the truce holding.
Mr. Poroshenko said in his statement that he had ordered his military commanders to respect the truce and asked his foreign minister to coordinate with the O.S.C.E. to ensure that the cease-fire was observed by both sides. The Ukrainian national information agency released a list of the 14 points included in the plan: some focused on the cease-fire itself, some on practical steps to get the government functioning again, and some on the political future of the Donbass region.
In the first hour after the cease-fire was to start, Mariupol appeared to be quiet. The agreement followed, almost verbatim, a cease-fire proposal issued by President Petro O. Poroshenko of Ukraine in June.
According to Ukrainian officials and news reports from Minsk, the cease-fire included provisions for a halt to offensive operations, an exchange of captives, the creation of safe corridors for workers to deliver aid and start rebuilding shattered infrastructure in the war zone, and monitoring of the Ukraine-Russia border. Sergei Taruta, the governor of Donetsk Province in eastern Ukraine, said the border provisions were crucial. “If we seal the borders, the problem will be resolved,” he said. It included amnesty for all those who disarm and who did not commit serious crimes, as well as the release of all hostages. Militias will be disbanded and a 10-kilometer buffer zone — about six miles — established along the Russian-Ukrainian border. A prisoner exchange was set to begin as early as Saturday, according to Interfax-Ukraine.
Ukraine and many Western observers have accused Russia of backing the rebels with fighters and equipment, and of moving its own troops into Ukrainian territory to support the rebels. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and his government have denied those accusations and insisted that Russia is not a party to the conflict. The area will be subject to joint patrols. The separatists agreed to leave the administrative buildings they control and to allow broadcasts from Ukraine to resume on local television.
The cease-fire agreement was announced in Minsk by Leonid D. Kuchma, a former president of Ukraine, representing the Ukrainian government, and by Alexander Zakharchenko, the prime minister and military commander of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, representing the rebels. Russia was represented at the talks by its ambassador to Ukraine, Mikhail Zurabov, and the O.S.C.E. by its ambassador to Belarus, Heidi Tagliavini. For the future, the agreement said power would be decentralized and the Russian language protected. An early, failed attempt by the Ukrainian government to ban Russian as an official language was one of the elements that inspired the uprising.
The announcement had been expected, after both Mr. Poroshenko and Mr. Putin said earlier this week that a truce was likely to emerge from the talks in Minsk. The agreement said the executive in control of each region, the equivalent of a governor, would be appointed after consultations with each region. It also promised early elections and a job-creation program.
Mr. Poroshenko had long insisted that he would never negotiate with “terrorists,” as he and others in the Ukrainian government have referred to the separatist militants. Instead, the government mounted a military offensive against the separatists that made considerable progress. But Russia demonstrated in recent days that it would intervene to prevent a conclusive defeat of the rebels, leaving Mr. Poroshenko with little alternative but to negotiate a cease-fire. Mr. Poroshenko confirmed the agreement in a statement posted on the presidential website.
Timothy Ash, a market analyst at Standard Bank in London who closely monitors developments in Ukraine and Russia, said the agreement signed in Minsk on Friday meant the conflict would probably be frozen in a political stalemate similar to those in other Russian-dominated, quasi-independent “gray zones” like Transnistria in Moldova and Abkhazia in Georgia. “The whole world is striving for peace. The whole of Ukraine is striving for peace, including millions of citizens in Donbass,” the statement said, referring to the region that includes the separatist strongholds.
“Russian regular and irregular forces are not going to withdraw unless Poroshenko delivers on Putin’s agenda for a federal solution for Ukraine, which is really a nonstarter for any Ukrainian politician and political suicide, in effect,” Mr. Ash wrote on Friday in a note to clients. Mr. Poroshenko said he had ordered the Ukrainian Army to stop firing and called for strict monitoring of the cease-fire by international observers.
Without a cease-fire now, Mr. Ash wrote, Mr. Poroshenko risked losing Mariupol, which remained under heavy attack by pro-Russian forces on Friday. “Any delay would probably have seen the loss of Mariupol, and then a land corridor secured by Russia to Crimea,” he wrote, which would have been “likely terminal” for Ukraine’s already struggling economy. The cease-fire proposals included a rough outline of a possible political outcome to the conflict, but negotiating that could be a significant hurdle. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia has been pressing for regional autonomy for the southeastern regions, which would allow Moscow to influence events in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital. But the Ukrainian government has thus far supported only the idea of decentralization.
The cease-fire was expected to be based on a plan offered by Mr. Putin on Wednesday, which included a call for an immediate end to offensive operations by both sides, a withdrawal of Ukrainian artillery out of range of separatist-controlled cities, an end to airstrikes, an exchange of all captives, the opening of humanitarian corridors for residents of the separatist-controlled areas, the repairing of damaged infrastructure, and the deployment of international observers to monitor the truce. Timothy Ash, a market analyst at Standard Bank in London who closely monitors developments in Ukraine and Russia, said the agreement appeared likely to usher in a long, frozen conflict. It could effectively become a political stalemate like those in other Russian-dominated, quasi-independent “gray zones,” including Transnistria in Moldova and Abkhazia along the border with Georgia.
Before the talks in Minsk, some separatist leaders had said they would respect a cease-fire, but others said they would reject it. The separatists also demanded that all Ukrainian forces withdraw completely from disputed areas. “Russian regular and irregular forces are not going to withdraw unless Poroshenko delivers on Putin’s agenda for a federal solution for Ukraine, which is really a nonstarter for any Ukrainian politician and political suicide, in effect,” Mr. Ash wrote on Friday in a note to clients. Had Mr. Poroshenko refused to negotiate a cease-fire, however, Ukraine would have risked losing Mariupol.
Ukrainian and rebel forces traded artillery fire for several hours near Mariupol on Friday morning. The sound of heavy artillery rounds landing several miles to the east was audible at midday at a military checkpoint on the eastern edge of the city, and Ukrainian forces returned the fire from inside the town. The agreement had been expected after both Mr. Poroshenko and Mr. Putin said earlier this week that a truce was likely to emerge from the talks.
Ukrainian soldiers mustered in the area said they were preparing an attack against the rebel forces, who had advanced to a town within about 10 miles of the city on Thursday. In Minsk, Ukraine was represented by a former president, Leonid Kuchma, and the rebels by Aleksandr Zakharchenko, the prime minister and military commander of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic.
“Yesterday they were attacking,” said a unit commander, who gave only his nickname, Gurza. “They took Shirokino yesterday, and now there is fighting there. We cannot see their forces. It is just artillery preparing the way.” He said the rebel forces who took Novoazovsk, a coastal town close to the Russian border, last week had since advanced about halfway from there to Mariupol. Russia was represented by its ambassador to Kiev, Mikhail Zurabov, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which is acting for Europe in the crisis, was represented by its ambassador here, Heidi Tagliavini.
Mr. Taruta, the provincial governor, said seven people had been killed in heavy fighting at Shirokino, four on Thursday and three on Friday, including two children. He said Ukrainian forces had repelled the rebels and had control of the town on Friday. Ukrainian forces had suffered heavy setbacks in the last two weeks, with the separatists breaking out of their isolation in the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk and opening a third front along the strategic southern coast around Mariupol.
The rebels have repeatedly said an attack on Mariupol itself was imminent, and a spokesman for the Ukrainian military, Col. Andriy Lysenko, said in Kiev on Friday that the rebels were moving tanks, artillery and other heavy equipment into position to mount the attack. He said Russia was also beginning to mass troops along the neck of land connecting the rest of Ukraine with the Crimean peninsula, which Russia annexed in March, with the intention of threatening Mariupol from two sides. The Russian-backed rebels, who seized control of the coastal town of Novoazovsk last week, had advanced about halfway from Novoazovsk to Mariupol, and they had said repeatedly before the cease-fire was announced that an attack on Mariupol was imminent.
On the road north from Mariupol toward Donetsk, Ukrainian soldiers were strengthening their defenses, preparing to repel any rebel approach from that direction. Officials interpreted the opening of a new, southern front as an attempt by Moscow to force Mr. Poroshenko to negotiate with the rebels, whom he has called terrorists.
“It’s very dangerous,” said a Ukrainian commander of a checkpoint there, who went by the nickname Panzer. He said the Russian Army had been deployed in support of the rebels and had unleashed devastating artillery fire against Ukrainian positions. Although some Ukrainians reject the idea of a compromise, a majority are weary of upheaval. The current crisis started with demonstrations in Kiev in November that resulted in the overthrow of the Russian-allied government and, eventually, a conflict in the east in which more than 2,600 people have died, by the United Nations’ count.
“The Russian Army is very good,” he said. “They don’t take risks. They see us and bombard us from a distance. They fire artillery in a square. They bomb our positions, the village and anything else in the square. We can do nothing. We don’t have artillery with us.” The conflict has developed into the most severe confrontation between Russia and the West since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, with repeated rounds of Western sanctions against Moscow and, this week, the rejuvenation of NATO to act as a deterrent against the Kremlin.
Ukrainian soldiers in Mariupol said before the cease-fire was to start that they did not trust the agreement in Minsk to end the fighting, noting that the last round of talks in August was followed by an intense artillery offensive around the city of Donetsk that forced Ukrainian troops back from large stretches of territory. They said they expected an outright assault on Mariupol at any time. Analysts were divided on whether the cease-fire would hold, not least because there were divisions among the separatists themselves about what they wanted. “We are planning to continue the course toward secession,” said Igor Plotnitskiy, the prime minister of the self-declared Luhansk People’s Republic, according to the RIA Novosti news service. “The cease-fire is a necessary measure. There is a lot of work ahead of us.”
The renewed violence came as NATO leaders, seeking to counter Russian aggression, approved plans for a rapid-reaction force in Eastern Europe that could mobilize if an alliance country in the region came under attack. The Ukrainian side also demonstrated a hard line. Prime Minister Arseniy P. Yatsenyuk said on Twitter that transforming the cease-fire into a lasting peace would require three things: a long-term cease-fire, the withdrawal of the Russian Army and a wall along the border.
“Should you even think of attacking one ally, you will be facing the whole alliance,” Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO’s secretary general, said at the meeting in Newport, Wales, according to The Associated Press. Although Ukraine is not a NATO member, alliance nations in Central and Eastern Europe have expressed alarm at the events in eastern Ukraine. Ukraine and many Western observers have accused Russia of backing the rebels with fighters and equipment, and of moving its own troops, armor and artillery into Ukrainian territory to carry the fight to the government. Mr. Putin and his government have denied those accusations and insisted that Russia is not a party to the conflict.
Though some Ukrainians reject the idea of compromise with the rebels, a majority are weary of upheaval. The current crisis started with demonstrations in Kiev, the capital, last November that resulted in the overthrow of the Russian-allied government and, eventually, a conflict in the east in which more than 2,600 people have died, by the United Nations’ count. The pause in the violence came as NATO leaders, seeking to counter Russian aggression, approved plans for a rapid-reaction force in Eastern Europe that could mobilize if an alliance country in the region came under attack.
With the NATO meeting in Wales largely focused on events in Ukraine, the government in Kiev tried on Friday to shine a spotlight on Russia’s direct involvement in fighting in the east. An estimated 2,000 Russian soldiers have died in the conflict, Colonel Lysenko said at a briefing in Kiev. He gave no basis or time frame for that figure, which could not be independently verified. He said a convoy of seven vehicles carrying dead and wounded soldiers had crossed from Ukraine into Russia on Thursday evening. “Should you even think of attacking one ally, you will be facing the whole alliance,” Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO’s secretary general, said at the meeting in Newport, Wales, according to The Associated Press. Although Ukraine is not a NATO member, alliance nations in Central and Eastern Europe have expressed alarm at the Russian-backed separatists’ fight for control of regions in eastern Ukraine.
There has been an outcry in Russia among military families over the lack of information about soldiers fighting in Ukraine. Some Russians have accused the government of hiding the information, much as it did during the wars in Afghanistan and Chechnya. Estimates of those killed and wounded have been far lower than the figure mentioned by Colonel Lysenko. Western leaders were also preparing another round of sanctions against Russia, but Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany said those might be rescinded if Russia withdrew its troops from Ukraine after the truce took effect. Russia has denied that its troops are actively involved in the fighting.
With the NATO meeting largely focused on events in Ukraine, the Ukrainian government tried on Friday to shine a spotlight on Russia’s direct involvement in fighting in the east. An estimated 2,000 Russian soldiers have died, Col. Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian military, said at a briefing in Kiev. He gave no basis or time frame for that figure, which could not be independently verified. He said a convoy of 10 vehicles carrying dead and wounded soldiers had crossed from Ukraine into Russia on Thursday evening.
There has been an outcry in Russia among military families over the lack of information about soldiers fighting in Ukraine. Some Russians have accused the government of hiding the information, much as it did during the wars in Afghanistan and Chechnya. But its estimates of those killed and wounded have been far lower than the figure given by Colonel Lysenko.