Nobody Has Firm Belief in Success of Minsk Deal - Poroshenko

KIEV (Sputnik) – Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko said Friday that the new Minsk agreements on regulating the crisis in eastern Ukraine gives hope, but he is unsure whether they will be fully implemented.

The leaders of the Normandy Quartet (Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine) held 16-hour talks on Ukraine in the Belarusian capital Minsk on Wednesday and early Thursday. During the meeting, the sides worked out a document stipulating a ceasefire, weapons withdrawal and a prisoner exchange.

"We managed to reach agreements that give hope that the events in Donbas will transition from the hot stage to a state of political regulation. I don't want anybody to have illusions and I don't want to seem naive – we are still far from peace…and nobody has a firm belief that the Minsk peace agreements will be strictly implemented," Poroshenko said during a visit to some educational facilities of the National Guard of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian leader expressed hope that the situation will deescalate, and peace will be achieved through ceasefire and withdrawal of artillery.

The leaders of Russia, Germany France and Ukraine convened in Minsk earlier this week amid a sharp deterioration of the situation in Donbas. Despite last September's truce, Kiev and independence supporters have continued to accuse each other of military confrontation.

According to the latest UN estimates, at least 5,486 people have been killed in the ongoing violence in Ukraine since the start of Kiev's military operation against independence supporters in the country's southeast in April, 2014.