Putin wants more talks over Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin has called on Ukraine's leadership and rebels to start genuine dialogue, saying Kiev should halt military operations and guarantee the rights of Russian speakers in the separatist east.

"It's necessary to start detailed, substantial dialogue," Putin said on Sunday. "This will guarantee success."

Putin made his comments after Ukraine's new Western-backed president, Petro Poroshenko, said he was prepared to talk to those separatists not implicated in "murder and torture" as he laid out the details of a new peace plan.

The Kremlin chief spoke to reporters after laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to commemorate the anniversary of the start of World War II in the Soviet Union in 1941 when Russia and Ukraine battled Nazi Germany together.

"Russia will certainly support these intentions. But at the end of the day, the most important thing is a political process. It's important for dialogue between all warring parties to originate on the basis of this peace plan," Putin said in televised remarks.

For the peace plan to work, Russian speakers in the separatist east should feel they are "an inalienable part" of Ukraine and know that their rights are guaranteed by the constitution, Putin said.

Poroshenko announced a unilateral weeklong ceasefire on Friday along with the peace plan, which Putin said at the time did not go far enough because it lacked an invitation to separatists to sit down at the negotiating table.

On Sunday, Putin said the fighting was continuing despite the cease-fire.

"Military operations have not stopped," he said. "I can't say who is doing this - whether this is a regular army or whether these are the armed units of some rightist forces - but this is happening."

The Russian president said Ukrainian government forces has used artillery in overnight fighting.

"Unfortunately, what we are seeing ... tells us that the fighting is ongoing, and last night we saw some active use of artillery from the Ukrainian side," Putin told the Rossiya-24 television channel.

"We need to ensure that all fighting is stopped."

Also on Sunday, Putin told his German and French counterparts the Ukraine peace plan should be "backed up" with a de facto ceasefire, according to a statement from the Kremlin.

"Putin backed the decision by P.A. Poroshenko to carry out a peace plan," the readout of the phone conversation read. "It was stressed that the intentions voiced by the head of the Ukrainian state should be backed up with a real cease-fire."

AFP - Reuters

(China Daily 06/23/2014 page12)