Bloomburg – 2/7/2015 – European and Russian leaders failed on Saturday to reach an agreement on ending the carnage in Ukraine in more than five hours of talks as U.S. officials debated new steps to pressure Russia, including military deployments in neighboring countries. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said it was unclear whether she and French President Francois Hollande have achieve a breakthrough with Russian President Vladimir Putin in talks later on Friday aimed at resolving the crisis in Ukraine.
Merkel and Hollande had flown to Kiev for talks with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on Thursday.