RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin met the leaders of Ukraine, France and Germany yesterday at a Paris summit on peace for Ukraine.

It was the first time Mr Putin had met Petro Poroshenko, Francois Hollande and Angela Merkel since signing a peace deal in Minsk in February.

The resulting ceasefire between the Ukrainian ­government in Kiev and anti-fascist forces in eastern Donbass has been broken several times, but has held in recent weeks.

Mr Hollande said that, if progress continued, he would propose ending the sanctions between the US and the EU and Russia that has hurt both sides.

Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe monitoring mission spokesman Michael Bociurkiw said: “We are now into an unprecedented period … of calm.”

Ukrainian Defence Minister Stepan Poltorak said on ­Thursday that Kiev would pull back smaller-calibre artillery from the front line by today if the ceasefire continued.