Moscow sources have stated that the latest attempt at a ceasefire from September 1st has broke down after little more than a week and earlier on September 13th, separatist leaders in eastern Ukraine have raised hopes when they announced a unilateral ceasefire, their first such offer.
By January 2015, full scale fighting had broken out again and in February, Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s François Hollande has stepped in to revive the ceasefire, brokering a "Package of Measures for the Implementation of the Minsk Agreements", known as Minsk II.
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The product of a marathon all-night negotiating session, Minsk II offers a detailed roadmap for resolving the conflict and the 13 point plan begins with a ceasefire and the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the front lines, to be monitored by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).
Domestically Ukraine’s president, Petro Poroshenko, faces staunch resistance to an agreement that grants Moscow most of what it wanted, saddling Kiev with responsibility for the separatist territories while giving them enough autonomy to hinder Ukraine’s Western integration. Working group meetings continue in Minsk, but they are a fig leaf for real progress.
