Signing of the Second Minsk Agreement (February 12, 2015)Minsk Agreement • June 29th, 2024
Contract Type FiledJune 29th, 2024A first Minsk Agreement between Russia, Ukraine, the OSCE, and representatives of the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk had been mediated in 2014 by France and Germany in order to stop the Donbas War between armed Russian separatists aided by Russian regular forces and the Ukrainian armed forces. The agreement was signed on September 5, 2014 but failed to end the fighting. Renewed negotiations, once again brokered by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President François Hollande, took place in the Belarusian capital of Minsk. These produced a “package of measures for the implementation of the Minsk agreements,” including a ceasefire, withdrawal of heavy weapons from the front line, release of prisoners of war, constitutional reform in Ukraine granting self-government to certain areas of Donbas and restoring control of the state border to the Ukrainian government. This video from public broadcaster ARD reports on the signing of the second Minsk agreement after 16