UKRAINE’S fragile ceasefire hung in the balance today after President Petro Poroshenko engaged in four-way talks with his Russian, German and French counterparts.

French officials said that the talks with Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande centred on establishing a full ceasefire by both sides, international monitoring of the border between Russia and Ukraine, freeing prisoners and holding substantial talks with Ukraine’s anti-Kiev rebels.

A Kremlin statement said that foreign ministers from the four countries would carry the four-way talks, sidelining US and EU representatives.

President Poroshenko had already extended the fragile ceasefire from seven days to 10 as part of a peace plan to end a conflict that has killed more than 400 people.

Sporadic fighting still flared yesterday despite the ceasefire. 

Shelling killed at least two people and destroyed several homes in the rebel-held city of Sloviansk in the eastern Donetsk region.

Mr Poroshenko has demanded that rebels return posts along the Russia border to Ukrainian control and allow international monitors to verify the ceasefire.

European Union leaders have pressed Russia to help de-escalate the situation or face the possibility of additional economic sanctions.

The four leaders spoke for two hours on Sunday as Mr Poroshenko struggled to get his peace plan past a wobbly start and fascist paramilitaries demanded military action against the separatists.

Mr Poroshenko says that his unilateral ceasefire was a first step to give rebels a chance to lay down their arms. 

Further steps would include an amnesty for separatists who have not committed "serious crimes," early local elections and changes in the constitution to decentralise power to Ukraine’s regions.

Shooting continued through Sunday night and into Monday morning in Sloviansk, with the army pitting artillery fire against small arms. 

Ukrainian police and prosecutors are investigating the death of cameraman Anatoly Klyan who was working for Russia's Channel One. 

He was fatally wounded when a bus carrying journalists and soldiers’ mothers to a Ukrainian military base was hit by gunfire.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry blamed the attack on Ukrainian soldiers and demanded an objective investigation. 

Mr Klan was the fifth journalist to die since the fighting began in April.