Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said on Wednesday that it was time for a "collective" search for peace in Ukraine, after a summit in Yerevan of the six-member Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO).
"Regarding Ukraine, I believe that the time has come for a joint collective search for a peace formula. Any war ends with peace negotiations. Any chance must be seized to achieve at least a truce," Tokayev said in remarks published on his website.
"We must not allow the fraternal Russian and Ukrainian peoples to part ways for tens or hundreds of years with mutual unhealed grievances."
Tokayev, who secured a second term in power in a snap election on Sunday, has in the past pushed back publicly against territorial claims made by President Vladimir Putin in Ukraine, souring relations between his former Soviet republic and Moscow.
(Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Caleb Davis; Editing by Kevin Liffey)