DONETSK, Ukraine — After Ukraine’s new president, Petro O. Poroshenko, told reporters in Kiev on Wednesday that he might soon order a temporary, unilateral cease-fire as part of a broader 14-point peace plan, it took all of several seconds for pro-Russian militants to rule it out. 
 
 “I am a condemned man,” said a stick-thin fighter who, like many others here, identified himself only by an alias, Tarik, for security reasons. Sipping tea in the gloom of the lobby of Donetsk’s rebel-occupied administration building on Wednesday afternoon, he patted the magazine of the automatic rifle slung across his chest. 
 
 Any cease-fire would certainly be violated by the Ukrainian Army, he said, adding that he and other pro-Russian separatists would be arrested the minute the government had the opportunity. 
 
 “What peace can they possibly offer me?” he asked. “If they want peace, then they can leave.” 
 
 Tarik and a dozen other rank-and-file fighters here reacted to Mr. Poroshenko’s proposal with a dark, belligerent skepticism. Most rejected the idea of disarming until a patchwork of amorphous conditions were met, suggesting that a truce would be awfully difficult to achieve. 
 
 Some demanded that the Ukrainian military leave the region, called Donbass, while others wanted a war tribunal for Ukraine’s newly elected leaders. Most said they wanted the restoration of “stability,” the precise definition of which remained elusive. 
 
 “Maybe there was a way back when this all just started, when the people were out here with the flags to make their point, and before the killing,” said Denis, a separatist fighter from Makeyevka, a depressed industrial town outside of Donetsk, when asked how and when the conflict might be resolved. 
 
 Another fighter jumped in helpfully. “The Third World War,” he said to nods of assent. 
 
 None said he was ready to lay down his arms. 
 
 The responses seemed to afford little hope that, as Mr. Poroshenko urged, a cease-fire “should receive support from all participants in the events in Donbass.” Toward that end, the president’s office announced that Mr. Poroshenko would meet on Thursday with what his office called the “legitimate” leaders from the east, including mayors and business representatives. 
 
 The Russian government has called repeatedly for Ukraine to stop its military crackdown on the separatists but has also insisted that it does not control, or speak for, the separatists. 
 
 But rebel leaders, some of whom were in Moscow on Wednesday, quickly dismissed Mr. Poroshenko’s proposal. Denis Pushilin, one of the leaders of the political wing of the Donetsk People’s Republic, said in television appearances in Moscow that he thought it was “pointless,” suggesting that it was the latest trick by Kiev to subdue the fighters. 
 
 Another rebel commander, Igor Strelkov, told Komsomolskaya Pravda, a Russian newspaper that regularly carries his statements, that Ukraine had already violated the cease-fire, though officially it had not yet even been declared. 
 
 In Kiev, Mr. Poroshenko told reporters that he planned to announce the cease-fire as part of a wider peace plan to end the more than two months of fighting in eastern Ukraine, where, the United Nations reported on Wednesday, at least 356 people are known to have died. 
 
 Mr. Poroshenko’s discussion of the peace plan followed a phone call late Tuesday with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, in which both sides said the cease-fire was a main topic. 
 
 Other elements of Mr. Poroshenko’s plan include sealing the border with Russia and amending the Ukrainian Constitution to allow for a “decentralization” plan that will give more authority to local governments. 
 
 The initial step, however, would be a halt to the Ukrainian military’s so-called antiterrorist operation against the pro-Russian militias, whose ranks include some Russian citizens who crossed the border to join the fight. Senior Russian officials have long insisted that any peace effort begin with such a step. 
 
 Also on Wednesday, Mr. Poroshenko nominated Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany, Pavlo Klimkin, as foreign minister, and asked Parliament to confirm him. Mr. Klimkin, a former deputy foreign minister, had an important role in negotiating the political and economic accords with the European Union that Viktor F. Yanukovych, then the president, refused to sign last November after long promising to do so, setting off months of civil unrest. Mr. Poroshenko has vowed to complete those agreements in the coming weeks. 
 
 Mr. Poroshenko also told reporters that he was awaiting a decision from lawmakers on holding early parliamentary elections, which he said were favored by 70 percent of Ukrainians. 
 
 Even on the eve of Mr. Poroshenko’s statements, heavy fighting in the Luhansk region on Tuesday left 27 injured and several dead, including two Russian state television journalists, according to a police spokeswoman for the region. ||||| Image copyright Reuters Image caption Petro Poroshenko spoke about his plans for a ceasefire at a military graduation ceremony 
 
 Ukraine's president has set out proposals for a peace plan for eastern Ukraine involving a unilateral ceasefire by government forces. 
 
 Petro Poroshenko said the temporary truce - expected "in hours or days" - would allow pro-Russian militants in the region to lay down their arms. 
 
 One separatist group has already rejected the proposal. 
 
 Mr Poroshenko's comments come after he held a phone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin. 
 
 Media caption Petro Poroshenko is known in Ukraine as the "Chocolate King" 
 
 They discussed a solution to the crisis in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian rebels are battling government forces. 
 
 More than 30 gunmen were killed and wounded in fighting near the town of Shchastya in the Luhansk region on Tuesday, a spokesman for the government's "anti-terrorism operation" said. 
 
 Kiev also said that 147 Ukrainian military personnel had been killed and 267 injured in fighting since March. 
 
 UN human rights investigators say the security situation in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions has deteriorated significantly over the past month. 
 
 Image copyright Reuters Image caption Flames could be seen erupting from the Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhgorod Pipeline on Tuesday 
 
 Image copyright AFP Image caption Government forces have been fighting pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine since April 
 
 A report revealed a rising number of abductions and killings, with civilians increasingly caught in the crossfire and thousands forced to flee the violence. 
 
 Meanwhile, Ukraine's Interior Minister Arsen Avakov has said an explosion at a major pipeline in central Ukraine was caused by a bomb. 
 
 He said explosives had been placed under a concrete support at the Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhgorod Pipeline. 
 
 No-one was reported injured by the blast. European and Russian companies said gas exports were not affected by Tuesday's pipeline explosion. 
 
 'New warfare' 
 
 Speaking at a graduation ceremony at the National University of Defence in Kiev, Mr Poroshenko said a "brief" truce would be introduced to allow "Russian mercenaries" to leave Ukraine. 
 
 "The peace plan begins with my order for a unilateral ceasefire," Mr Poroshenko announced on Wednesday. 
 
 "We expect that disarmament of military groups and restoration of order will take place right after it." 
 
 The president added that his peace plan would have 14 points, including the closure of the Ukrainian-Russian border and changes to the constitution to give more power to the regions. 
 
 A presidential spokesman told the BBC the ceasefire could be announced in "hours or days" but gave no further details. 
 
 But Denis Pushilin, one of the leaders of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, a breakaway area which has asked to join Russia, rejected the proposal for the rebels to lay down their arms, Russia's TV channel Dozhd reports. 
 
 Mr Poroshenko also said Russia was waging "a new type of warfare" with the use of professional subversive groups and volunteers. 
 
 The Kremlin confirmed that Mr Poroshenko and Mr Putin "touched upon" the issue of a possible ceasefire during their talks on Tuesday, but gave no details. 
 
 Meanwhile Russia says it has launched a criminal investigation into Ukraine's interior minister and a local governor over the killings of civilians and journalists. 
 
 Mr Avakov and Igor Kolomoisky, governor of Dnipropetrovsk, are accused of organising military operations, including rocket strikes, in cities such as Donetsk, Sloviansk and Mariupol that left more than 100 dead, Russian state media said. ||||| An armed pro-Russian separatist with attached orange ribbon of St. George, a symbol widely associated with pro-Russian protests in Ukraine, stands guard at a road check point outside the eastern Ukrainian city of Luhansk June 8, 2014. 
 
 KIEV (Reuters) - After a late-night telephone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on Wednesday set out proposals for a peace plan for eastern Ukraine involving a unilateral ceasefire by government forces. 
 
 Speaking to students at a military institute in Kiev, Poroshenko outlined a 14-step plan, including an amnesty for separatist fighters who lay down arms, and tighter controls over Ukraine's border with Russia. Acting Defence Minister Mykhailo Koval told journalists in Kiev the ceasefire "will happen in the next few days". 
 
 Ukraine accuses Russia of backing the rebels in the industrial Russian-speaking east who rose up after mass protests in Kiev toppled Viktor Yanukovich, a president sympathetic to Moscow. It says the rebels have been bringing in weapons across the long border with Russia. 
 
 "The plan will start with my order for a unilateral ceasefire," Poroshenko said. "Immediately after this, we need very quickly to get support for the peace plan ... from all participants." 
 
 Poroshenko had said on Monday that a ceasefire could start only if the border was secure, and that he had ordered troops to regain control of it to pave the way for a truce and peace talks. 
 
 The Kremlin said Putin's conversation with Poroshenko late on Tuesday night had "touched on the theme of a possible ceasefire in the area of military action in southeastern Ukraine". 
 
 Moscow has urged a swift end to what it calls a "punitive operation" by Ukrainian forces against pro-Russian separatists in the east. 
 
 Relations between the two neighbours are in tatters, three months after Russia labelled the uprising against Yanukovich a Western-backed coup, then annexed the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea from Ukraine. 
 
 Moscow has grudgingly acknowledged Poroshenko as Ukraine’s new elected leader, but tensions are still high, exacerbated by Russia’s decision to cut off gas supplies to Ukraine after the two sides failed to agree a regime for pricing and the settlement of Ukraine’s debts. 
 
 On Wednesday, Russian investigators accused Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov and Ihor Kolomoisky, governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region in the east, of criminal acts in the government's military push against the separatists. 
 
 A spokesman for the federal Investigative Committee said they were under investigation on charges including murder, kidnapping and using illegal methods of warfare - although it was not immediately clear under what jurisdiction. 
 
 "Kolomoisky and Avakov are literally drowning the country in the blood of its own people," spokesman Vladimir Markin said in a statement. 
 
 The Kremlin also said Putin had expressed his concern to Poroshenko over the deaths of two journalists for Russian state television, who were killed in shelling as Ukrainian forces fought pro-Russian separatists near the eastern city of Luhansk. 
 
 Poroshenko expressed his condolences and assured Putin there would be an investigation and that measures would be taken to protect journalists. 
 
 (writing by Alissa de Carbonnel; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
– Ukraine's new president talked to Vladimir Putin last night, and today, Petro Poroshenko appears ready for a ceasefire, the New York Times reports. Poroshenko says he'll order the unilateral move once the border is secure; he believes "all illegal military units" will follow suit, per Russian and Ukrainian reports. During their call, "the presidents of Ukraine and Russia discussed a number of priority measures to be taken for a sustainable ceasefire, and the effective ways of monitoring it," Ukraine says in a statement. The ceasefire could come within "hours or days," a Ukrainian presidential rep tells the BBC. Poroshenko today told graduating students that a "brief" agreement would give "Russian mercenaries" a chance to leave the country. He discussed a 14-step plan involving amnesty for separatist fighters, Reuters reports. "The plan will start with my order for a unilateral ceasefire," he said. "Immediately after this, we need very quickly to get support for the peace plan ... from all participants." Russia's foreign minister has previously suggested that separatists would likely halt violence given an end to Ukraine's military action, the Times notes.