Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko says that he trusts his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko entirely and that Belarus plays an important role in organizing the Minsk negotiations.

"Do I trust Lukashenko? I do, 100%," Poroshenko said at the first Forum of Regions of Belarus and Ukraine in Gomel on Friday.

"We must do everything we can to end this war. We must do everything we can to stop Ukrainians getting killed. We must do everything we can to remove Russian troops. And we must do everything we can to launch the political settlement process through elections, not the fake elections that Russia wants to hold a week from now, but real elections, and the role of Belarus here is extremely important," Poroshenko said.

The Trilateral Contact Group meets in Minsk, and Belarus "does all it can to organize this work," he said.

Thousands of hostages have been released thanks to deals struck in Minsk, Poroshenko said.

"I am very glad that thanks to our agreements, the diplomatic blockade [of Belarus] was broken, and for us this, too, is important because for me, a part of Belarus will forever remain in my heart," he said.