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Contract Group on Ukraine begins its meeting in Minsk

KIEV, October 5. /TASS/. Members of the Contact Group on the settlement in eastern Ukraine have begun talks in the Belarusian capital, Darya Olifer, a spokesperson for Kiev’s envoy in the group, said on Wednesday.

"A meeting of Trilateral Contact Group members has begun in Minsk," she wrote on her Facebook page.

The outcome of the previous meeting held in Minsk on September 21 was the signing of a framework agreement on the disengagement of the parties' forces and means in the Donbass region. In accordance with this document, it was planned to create security zones in the populated localities of Zolotoye (LPR), Petrovskoye (DPR) and Stanitsa Luganskaya (LPR) within 13 days. In the event of the implementation of the plan it was planned to agree on the next four areas at the next meeting of the Contact Group on October 5.

However, on October 1, the day when the beginning of troops withdrawal was scheduled to begin, the parties were able to do so only in the Zolotoye area. In two other areas the withdrawal has not taken place up to now, with Kiev and representatives of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics blaming each other for the failure of the peace initiative.