MINSK, September 06, /ITAR-TASS/. Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko on Saturday thanked Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko for his active role in the work of the Contact Group on the settlement of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

“The head of the Ukrainian state specially called Alexander Lukashenko to thank him for the role Belarus and personally its President had played in the fruitful work of the Contact Group in Minsk,” the presidential press service said.

It quoted Poroshenko as saying that the ceasefire protocol signed in Minsk “will lay the groundwork for further progress in the peaceful settlement of the situation in Ukraine”.

Poroshenko and Lukashenko also discussed economic cooperation between their countries, trade relations with the Customs Union (Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia) and Ukraine’s election as a non-permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, the press service said.