Big news, if accurate...
BREAKING: Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko says he will order a cease-fire on September 5 and hopes implementation of a peace plan will begin the same day.
BREAKING: Senior separatist leaders say they are ready to order a cease-fire in eastern Ukraine on September 5 if agreement is reached with Ukrainian government representatives at talks in Minsk.
This is what Poroshenko said:
"At 1400 local time (1300 Prague time), provided the meeting takes place, I will call on the General Staff to set up a bilateral cease-fire and we hope that the implementation of the peace plan will begin tomorrow," Poroshenko said on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Wales.
Our news desk wraps together news of a possible cease-fire tomorrow:
Senior pro-Russian separatist leaders in eastern Ukraine say are ready to order a cease-fire if an agreement is reached with Ukrainian officials at talks in Minsk on September 5.
The reports come after President Petro Poroshenko said he would order Ukrainian forces to begin a cease-fired the same day if the Minsk meeting takes place at 1400 local time (1300 Prague time).
Poroshenko said on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Wales on September 4 that he would call on the Ukrainian Army's General Staff to set up a bilateral cease-fire that could be implemented on September 5.
He said a document would be signed in Minsk providing for the "gradual introduction of a peace plan" for the conflict that has killed more than 2,600 people.
Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a cease-fire proposal on September 3.
Hollande on the Mistral deal:
French President Francois Hollande has said a cease-fire and a political settlement in Ukraine are conditions for France to deliver the first of two Mistral-class warships to Russia.
Speaking on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Wales on September 4, Hollande said the contract to supply the vessels was neither cancelled nor suspended.
But he said the conditions for delivering the first ship, due to be handed over to Russia in October, did not exist.
France announced on September 3 that Moscow's aggressive actions in eastern Ukraine were the reasons for the decision not to deliver the warship, called the "Vladivostok."
France had come under strong public pressure from the United States and European partners to scrap the 1.2 billion euro ($1.6 billion), signed under former President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2011.