Peace talks enter 12th hour of negotiations: Four-party talks held in Minsk to end Ukraine crisis

[Mix999]

[img]http://cdn.rt.com/files/news/38/79/f0/00/34665987989.si.jpg[/img]

[quote]Leaders of Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany have gathered in Minsk, Belarus, for what is widely viewed as a last attempt to stop the violence in Eastern Ukraine. The talks come as deaths continue to pile up in the civil war-torn nation.

Read Minsk conference LIVE UPDATES

Wednesday’s meeting in Minsk has drawn worldwide attention, with some 400 journalists covering the event. Even on Wednesday morning there was no certainty that the talks would actually go as planned.[/quote]

It is around 8 am where they are and the talks are apparently still going, sources as well as live updates posted below. This could be a huge breakthrough.

[url]http://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2015/02/08/396720/4party-Ukraine-talks-to-be-held-in-Minsk[/url]
[url]http://rt.com/news/231291-minsk-meeting-ukraine-ceasefire/[/url]
[url]http://rt.com/news/231327-minsk-peace-talks-updates/[/url]
[url]http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/11404756/Ukraine-crisis-Minsk-peace-talks-live.html[/url]

[editline]Edited:[/editline]

Some more:

[quote]The tense negotiations entered their eleventh hour after opening on Wednesday evening with a brief handshake between arch-foes Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who were meeting for the first time since October.
The crunch four-way meeting with Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, and President Francois Hollande of France in the Belarusian capital was the climax of a frantic European diplomatic drive aimed at stopping the worst East-West crisis since the end of the Cold War from escalating.
Underscoring the urgency, the number of those reported killed in the hours before the make-or-break talks rose to at least 49 as rebels said another civilian was killed when a hospital in their bastion Donetsk was shelled as the leaders met, following the earlier deaths of 16 people in a devastating rocket attack.

"Today the peace process for Ukraine is all about Minsk and I hope that the meeting will fulfil our best expectations," Poroshenko told host Belarussian leader Alexander Lukashenko ahead of the talks.
By 6 am local time (0300 GMT) the marathon negotiations passed the ten-hour mark and the four leaders remained shut in an ornate meeting room in Minsk's opulent presidential palace without their advisers.[/quote]

[url]http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/11407532/Last-ditch-Ukraine-peace-talks-drag-on-till-dawn.html[/url]

[Viper123_SWE]

I'm gonna hope for the best...

[spazthemax]

I can't imagine being in the same room as Poroshenko and Putin right now

[Zenreon]

I feel like the only things that could happen are either some sort of East/West Ukraine, or otherwise a continuation of hostilities. It wouldn't be the first time this sort of meeting ended in a giant wall.

[EmperorScorpious]

Everyone looks grim in that photo except for Putin with that smug smile.

[The Wroth]

Would love to hear the details of their talks. Here have some links.
[url]https://twitter.com/rConflictNews[/url]
[url]http://www.conflict-news.com/live-feeds/ukraine/[/url]