Ukraine’s leader calls for unity

MARIUPOL, Ukraine – Seeking to rally national unity, President Petro Poroshenko visited a southeastern port Monday that has been assaulted for days by Russian-backed separatists and declared the city would remain a part of Ukraine.

After a series of military defeats to increasingly confident rebel forces in the country’s eastern regions, Ukraine signed a cease-fire deal Friday that has been widely viewed at home as an act of capitulation. Much of the region has remained calm as the truce appeared to be holding, although sporadic unrest was reported.

“We will do everything to ensure there is peace, but we will also brace ourselves for the defense of our country,” Poroshenko told metal workers at a plant that was within the range of the rebels’ rockets.

Also Monday, the Kremlin said Poroshenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke by telephone and “continued to discuss steps helping peaceful settlement in southeastern Ukraine.”

The two leaders had also talked Saturday about implementing the cease-fire plan in the conflict that has lasted nearly five months and killed at least 3,000, according to a U.N. estimate.

“The dialogue will continue,” the Kremlin said without elaborating.

Also Monday, the European Council formally adopted a package of further sanctions against Russia but delayed enforcement to see if the cease-fire holds.

Council President Herman Van Rompuy said the sanctions will be implemented in the next few days, which would leave time for “an assessment of the implementation of the cease-fire agreement and the peace plan.”

The European Union sanctions are expected to be coordinated with a new round of U.S. sanctions, a Western diplomat said. The U.S. sanctions are ready for release, the diplomat said, but the Obama administration wants to wait to act in concert with Europe to maximize the impact of the sanctions and present a united front against Russia.

Poroshenko’s trip to Mariupol came days after it came under sustained shelling from rebels stationed along the 40-mile stretch between the strategic port on the Sea of Azov and the Russian border.

“This city was, is, and will be Ukrainian!” he told the crowd under the gaze of a tight security detail.

The agreement reached in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, called for an immediate halt to fighting and an exchange of prisoners. It also called for the central government to give a greater degree of autonomy to the separatist Russian-speaking regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, although details remained vague.

While insisting the agreement would not lead to the breakup of Ukraine, Poroshenko expressed some openness to further discussions on the shape of the country.

“I think that we should elect the real representatives of Donetsk and Luhansk. And we, with them, can negotiate anything, excluding the sovereignty of territorial integrity,” he said, speaking in English at a news conference in Mariupol.

Poroshenko also said thousands of prisoners would be released by the rebels. He later announced that 20 Ukrainian soldiers had been freed.