Work to disengage forces of Donbas conflict sides to continue - Poroshenko
BERLIN. Oct 20 (Interfax) - The 'Normandy Four' leaders agreed at their meeting in Berlin that after the sides' forces and hardware were disengaged at certain sectors of the contact line in Donbas, this work would continue, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said.
"We agreed that after we completed forces' disengagement at three preliminary sectors, I mean Zolote, Petrivske and Stanytsia Luhanska, permanent, 24/7 monitoring posts of the OSCE [Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe] should be installed there, and after that we would start negotiations on the next four places for disengagement," he said at a press conference after the 'Normandy format' meeting (Ukraine, Germany, France and Russia) in Berlin overnight into Thursday.
The Ukrainian side insisted on Debaltseve being included in these next four places for the further disengagement of forces and hardware, the president said.
Debaltseve should be on the list of places where the sides' forces and hardware will pull back from the contact line because "under the memorandum of September 19 [2014, when the Minsk agreements were signed] and as of February 12 [2015, when in the Belarusian capital the 'Normandy Four' leaders signed the Package of Measures to implement the Minsk agreements], this territory was under the control of the Ukrainian military, and we believe that it will largely contribute to de-escalation," Poroshenko said.
The sides in the talks once again reiterated the need for a comprehensive and immediate ceasefire, he said.