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What followed the Paris summit on Ukraine peace
Summary
A look back at the Normandy Format talks in Paris and the ceasefire pledge that came out of them, in the days before 12 December 2019.
What had the Paris summit achieved by 12 December 2019? Three days earlier, on 9 December 2019, Volodymyr Zelensky, Vladimir Putin, Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel had met in the French capital for talks on ending the war in Donbas.
The meeting was notable on two counts. It was the first time Putin and Zelensky had met, and the first four-way leaders' meeting in the Normandy Format since 2016.
A ceasefire pledge
Following what was described as a breakthrough in the talks, Russia and Ukraine agreed to implement a ceasefire in the Donbas by the end of 2019. That commitment was the most concrete result of the Paris meeting, and it set a deadline of only a few weeks.
The format behind the talks
The Normandy Format brought together Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France. The four countries first met informally in 2014, during the 70th anniversary commemorations of D-Day in Normandy. The group later played a substantial role in mediating the Minsk agreements between 2014 and 2015.
The format continued to operate until 2022. Later meetings that year failed to ease rising tensions before Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
As of 12 December 2019, the Paris meeting stood as the latest chapter in that diplomacy, with a stated ceasefire target of the end of the year.
