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Francois Hollande

FRENCH President Francois Hollande said yesterday he and German Chancellor Angela Merkel would visit Kiev and Moscow in a fresh push for peace in Ukraine, but warned diplomacy “cannot go on indefinitely”.Hollande said that after the repeated failure of diplomatic efforts to stem fighting between Kiev and separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine, he and Merkel had come up with a new initiative to propose to warring parties.

“We will propose a new solution to the conflict based on the territorial integrity of Ukraine. We will discuss it with President Petro Poroshenko today and on Friday (today) in Moscow with the Russian president,” Hollande said.

While Ukraine is hoping the United States will step in and provide its troops with weapons to better defend themselves against pro-Russian separatists, France and Germany are still betting on peace talks.

“We always think war is for others, far away, not for our generation. But just a few hours flight away, civilians are dying every day, heavy weapons are being used, hospitals are targeted and trenches dug. In a few months we have gone … from conflict to war,” said Hollande.

He said one option swirling in the West was “to arm the protagonists because, some are doing it, Russia for the separatists, so let’s do it for the Ukrainians to allow them to defend themselves.”

He said France was not entering this debate.

“Then there is another option, it is not certain it will succeed but if we don’t try we will never know. That is the option of diplomacy, negotiation (but) that cannot go on indefinitely.”

He mentioned the failure to find a lasting peace after he brought the Ukrainian and Russian leaders together for talks in Normandy last year, and again when an accord was signed in Minsk to halt the conflict.

Hollande said the new initiative was “not just to talk but to find a text that can be accepted by all parties.”

“If we fail . . . what will we say? That France and Germany as European friends of Ukraine and Russia had done all that they could to succeed.”

Moscow confirmed that President Vladimir Putin would meet Merkel and Hollande on Friday.

Moscow denies allegations by Ukraine and its Western allies that it