Angela Merkel urges Vladimir Putin to help end violence in eastern Ukraine
Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists blame one another for the latest flare-up in a conflict that has killed about 10,000 people since April 2014
Berlin — In a telephone call on Tuesday, German leader Angela Merkel urged Russia’s Vladimir Putin to use his influence on separatists in eastern Ukraine to stop the violence there, and the two agreed on the need for new ceasefire efforts, a German government spokesperson said. Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists have blamed one another for the latest flare-up in a conflict that has killed about 10,000 people since April 2014. "The German chancellor and the Russian president agreed that new efforts must be made to secure a ceasefire, and asked foreign ministers and their advisers to remain in close contact," government spokesperson Steffen Seibert said. Merkel and French President Francois Hollande have long tried to broker an end to the conflict but the two-year-old Minsk peace deal has merely locked the two sides in a stalemate. The US and EU have imposed sanctions on Russia. Ukraine and Nato accuse the Kremlin of fuelling the conflict by supporting separatists with troop...
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