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What did the Paris summit achieve in December 2019?
Summary
A look back at the Normandy Format meeting that brought Putin and Zelensky face to face for the first time.
What came out of the Paris summit on 9 December 2019? The meeting brought together Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky, Russia's Vladimir Putin, France's Emmanuel Macron and Germany's Angela Merkel for peace talks on the war in Donbass.
Two points stood out. It was the first time Putin and Zelensky had met. It was also the first four-way leaders' meeting of its kind since 2016.
A format with a track record
The Normandy Format took its name from the four countries' first informal meeting in 2014, during the 70th anniversary commemorations of D-Day in Normandy, France. The group later played a substantial role in mediating the Minsk agreements between 2014 and 2015. The Paris meeting therefore revived a channel that had already been used to manage the conflict.
The ceasefire pledge
Following a breakthrough in the talks, Russia and Ukraine agreed to implement a ceasefire in Donbass by the end of 2019. That gave the meeting a concrete, time-limited commitment, set against a short window of only a few weeks.
What came later
The Normandy Format continued to meet until 2022. Further meetings in 2022 failed to de-escalate rising tensions before Russia's invasion of Ukraine. That outcome lay well beyond 9 December 2019, when the Paris talks marked a personal first for the two presidents and a renewed attempt by the four countries to secure a halt to fighting.
