Kiev: Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko has dissolved the parliament and called for snap elections, as the government forces continue to fight pro-Russian rebel forces in the east.
Elections would be held on 26 October, he said in a statement. Poroshenko said many current MPs were backers of ousted President Viktor Yanukovych and that the majority of Ukrainians wanted a new parliament. Poroshenko said that the dissolution, signalled by the breakup of the majority coalition last month, was in line with "the expectations of the vast majority of the citizens of Ukraine" and called it a move toward "cleansing" the parliament.
More than 2,000 people have died in months of fighting between Ukrainian forces and separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The two regions declared independence from Kiev, following Russia's annexation of the southern Crimean peninsula from Ukraine in March.
Poroshenko and Russian Prseident Vladimir Putin will meet on the sidelines of a summit in Minsk on Tuesday afternoon. Poroshenko, on Monday expressed "extraordinary concern" over the alleged military moves and the second convoy in a telephone call with Herman van Rompuy, president of the European Council.
The Minsk summit is a meeting between the EU and the heads of state of Putin's Customs Union, which includes Belarus, Russia and Kazakhstan. Russia has long wanted Ukraine to join the Customs Union, and it was former president Viktor Yanukovych's U-turn over signing an EU integration pact in favour of further consultations on the Customs Union that sparked the protests last December that brought about his downfall.