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MINSK, Belarus — Peace talks over Ukraine collapsed on Saturday after just more than four hours
with no tangible progress toward a new cease-fire but with Ukraine’s representative and separatist
envoys angrily accusing each other of sabotaging the meeting.

Ukraine’s representative, former President Leonid Kuchma, left the talks in Minsk, Belarus,
telling the Interfax news agency that separatist officials had undermined the meeting by making
ultimatums and refusing “to discuss a plan of measures for a quick cease-fire and a pull-back of
heavy weapons.”

Denis Pushilin, one of the separatist officials, told the Russian news agency RIA that they were
ready for dialogue “but not ready for ultimatums from Kyiv while shelling by their forces is going
on in the background of towns in the Donbass (industrialized eastern Ukraine).”

The meeting of the “contact group,” which also involves a Russian envoy and an official from the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, took place in the Belarussian capital even as
fighting between Kyiv’s forces and the Russian-backed rebels raged on in Ukraine’s east, claiming
more civilian and military lives.

The outcome dashed hopes that a new cease-fire could be put together soon to stem nine months of
conflict pitting Ukrainian government forces against Russian-backed separatists who have declared “
people’s republics” in eastern Ukraine.

Shortly before the Minsk talks broke up, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President
Francois Hollande and Russia’s Vladimir Putin had expressed hope in a three-way phone call that the
meeting would at least produce a cease-fire agreement.

More than 5,000 people have died since the conflict erupted last April after Russia’s annexation
of Crimea in response to the ousting of a Moscow-backed president in Kyiv by street protests.

Heavy shelling continued on Saturday in Ukraine’s eastern regions as the separatists sought to
tighten a circle around government forces clinging to control of the strategic rail and road
junction of Debaltseve.

Regional police Chief Vyacheslav Abroskin, in a Facebook post, said 12 civilians had been killed
on Saturday by separatist shelling of the town, which lies to the northeast of Donetsk.

Defense Minister Stepan Poltorak said 15 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed and 30 wounded in
clashes across the east.

Debaltseve is on the main highway linking Donetsk and the other big rebel-controlled city of
Luhansk and is also a vital rail link for goods traffic from Russia which Kyiv accuses of arming
the rebels.