MOSCOW, June 25 (RAPSI) - The Federation Council, Russia's upper house of parliament, canceled the resolution to use the armed forces in Ukraine.

On Tuesday, before his flight to Vienna for an official visit, President Vladimir Putin sent a letter to Federation Council Chair Valentina Matviyenko and proposed canceling the resolution. Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov said the measure was intended to stabilize the situation in eastern Ukraine and comes before trilateral talks on the issue.

On Wednesday, 153 senators voted in favor of canceling the resolution and only one member of the Federation Council raised his voice against the decision.

A special operation was launched in Ukraine in mid-April to suppress the independence fighters in eastern Ukraine, who do not recognize the legitimacy of the Kiev authorities that were brought to power by ultranationalist activists as a result of a regime change on February 22, when President Viktor Yanukovych fled the country. The bloodiest battles have so far been waged in Slavyansk in the north of the Donetsk Region and in Kramatorsk and Mariupol in the region’s south.

Moscow has described that operation, which has claimed dozens of lives on both sides, including among civilians, as punitive and is urging Kiev to put an end to it immediately.

Last Friday, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko ordered a unilateral ceasefire between independence supporters and the government forces conducting a special military operation in the country’s east until June 27.

On Monday, Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic Alexander Boroday announced that the self-defense forces would comply with the conditions of the ceasefire.