France's Hollande says coming hours decisive for Ukraine

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - French President Francois Hollande said on Thursday that the deal agreed in Minsk by Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine aimed at ending the conflict in Ukraine was not a guarantee of long-term success. "The agreement doesn't guarantee that there will be lasting success in the coming days, that supposes that we will continue to be vigilant and apply pressure and pursue the action that has been taken thanks to the initiative launched by the chancellor (Angela Merkel) and myself," Hollande told reporters in Brussels as he arrived for a European summit. He said everything could still go either way and that the coming hours would be decisive. "We're at a crucial point in time, an agreement has been reached, it's more than a ray of hope, and at the same time it's a point where everything can still be decided in one way or the other, and the coming hours will be decisive," Hollande said. (Reporting by Julien Ponthus, Writing by James Regan. Editing by Alexandria Sage.)