MOSCOW, December 15. /TASS/. The Russian and Ukrainian Presidents, Vladimir Putin and Vladimir Zelensky, have started dialogue, but they have failed to come to terms on a whole range of issues so far, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the Bolshaya Igra (Big Game) TV program on Russia’s Channel One.
"Putin and Zelensky have started talking to each other. However, they are far from reaching an agreement on a whole range of issues, they are using different terms," Peskov said.
"I think their one-on-one conversation lasted 10-15 minutes, so this is not that brief," Peskov said. "Later, they were interrupted by President [of France Emmanuel] Macron who insisted on continuing the work in the Normandy format."
A Normandy Four summit was held in Paris on December 9, for the first time after a three-year break. Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia, Emmanuel Macron of Germany, Vladimir Zelensky of Ukraine and German Chancellor Angela Merkel gathered in the Elysee Palace to discuss ways of settling the conflict in Donbass.
The seven-hour talks yielded a final document committing to paper a number of concrete accords. Among the summit’s expected results was an agreement to exchange prisoners of war in Donbass on an all-for-all basis by the year-end. The summit’s participants also called for a total and comprehensive ceasefire until the end of 2019 and agreed to support an accord within the framework of the Contact Group on the political settlement in eastern Ukraine on three additional sections of disengaging forces and weapons in the conflict area by the end of March 2020.