Ukraine says Russia pulling forces out, sees boost for peace

KIEV: Ukraine’s president said on Wednesday Russia had removed the bulk of its forces from his country, raising hopes for a peace drive now underway after five months of conflict in which more than 3,000 people have been killed.
Moscow denies sending troops into eastern Ukraine to support pro-Russian rebels battling Ukrainian forces, despite what Kiev and its Western backers say is overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Moscow also denies arming the separatists.
President Petro Poroshenko told a televised Cabinet meeting Ukraine would remain a sovereign, united country under the terms of a peace roadmap approved last Friday, but said parts of the east under rebel control would get special status.
“According to the latest information I have received from our intelligence, 70 percent of Russian troops have been moved back across the border,” Poroshenko said.
The president promised to introduce a bill as early as next week that would offer greater autonomy to rebellious regions in the pro-Russia east, where separatists have been battling government troops for almost five months.
But Poroshenko said the regions would remain part of Ukraine and rejected the idea of federalization, something both Russia and the Russian-backed separatists are still pushing for even after a cease-fire that began Friday.
Poroshenko said the cease-fire was not proving easy to maintain because “terrorists” were constantly trying to provoke Kiev’s forces.
Ukraine’s military recorded at least six violations of the cease-fire overnight but said theconre were no casualties. Five servicemen have been killed during the cease-fire, Ukraine says. A civilian was also killed at the weekend during shelling of the eastern port of Mariupol.
Poroshenko said Ukraine was regrouping its forces in eastern Ukraine, not in preparation for a new offensive against the rebels, as they have suggested, but in order to defend territory from possible attack by the separatists.
The Kremlin said Russian President Vladimir Putin and Poroshenko were broadly satisfied with how the cease-fire, in place for nearly five days, was holding in Ukraine. The two leaders spoke by phone on Tuesday for the second time this week.