The Ukrainian government and the pro-independence insurgents have agreed to withdraw their heavy weapons from the front line in eastern Ukraine over the next two weeks.

"The plan was signed in the early hours of this morning. We have two weeks to remove heavy weapons starting from today," the Interfax news agency quoted senior rebel commander Eduard Basurin as saying.

A government spokesman also confirmed the plan to withdrawal heavy weapons starting from Sunday.

Meanwhile, TASS news agency quoted Basurin as saying that the actual pullout will start from Tuesday and preparations are underway.

The pullback is part of the latest cease-fire deal agreed upon among the Contact Group members over Ukraine crisis in the Belarusian capital of Minsk where leaders of Russia, France, Germany and Ukraine helped materialize the hard-won deal after overnight talks on Feb. 12.

The situation in eastern Ukraine seems to show encouraging progress as Kiev and the insurgents swapped altogether nearly 200 prisoners of war on Saturday evening as they had planned and no shelling, according to the Interfax, was recorded throughout the night.

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