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 The coordinated trip by Chancellor Angela Merkel and President
Francois Hollande comes as rebels steadily advance on a railway hub
held by Ukrainian troops after launching an offensive that scuppered
a five-month-old ceasefire.
Washington has begun openly talking of arming Ukraine for the first
time. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry also flew to Kiev on
Thursday, although he had no plans to go to Moscow. His likely
cabinet colleague, defense secretary nominee Ashton Carter, told
lawmakers on Wednesday that he favored arming Ukraine's forces.
Peace talks collapsed on Saturday in Belarus, EU leaders are
expected to consider punishing new economic sanctions against Moscow
next week, and Germany hosts world leaders at a security conference
over the weekend at which Ukraine is expected to be the main
subject.
"Together with Angela Merkel we have decided to take a new
initiative," Hollande told a news conference. "We will make a new
proposal to solve the conflict which will be based on Ukraine's
territorial integrity."
He and Merkel would meet President Petro Poroshenko in Kiev on
Thursday and Russia's Vladimir Putin in Moscow the following day.
 "For several days Angela Merkel and I have worked on a text ... a
text that can be acceptable to all," Hollande said.
He warned about risks of escalation in Ukraine: "Now we are in a
war, and in a war that could be a total war."
Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert said in a statement: "In view of
the escalating violence in recent days, the chancellor and President
Hollande are intensifying their efforts, which have been going on
for months, for a peaceful settlement to the conflict in eastern
Ukraine."
The Kremlin confirmed the visit. Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told
Russian news agencies the leaders would discuss concrete steps to
resolve the conflict.
NATO says Russia has sent weapons, funds and troops on the ground to
assist the rebel advance, undermining the five-month-old ceasefire
in eastern Ukraine where war has already killed more than 5,000
people.
Moscow denies involvement in fighting for territory the Kremlin now
calls "New Russia".
The remarks by President Barack Obama's nominee for defense
secretary were Washington's clearest signal yet that it is
considering arming Ukraine. Carter told his Senate confirmation
hearing he would "very much incline" toward supplying arms.
"The nature of those arms, I can't say right now," Carter said. "But
I incline in the direction of providing them with arms, including,
to get to what I'm sure your question is, lethal arms."
Asked about the risks of escalation, he said: "I think the economic
and political pressure on Russia has to remain the main center of
gravity of our effort in pushing back."
Kerry's visit is more about diplomatic support for now. U.S.
officials said he would promise $16.4 million in humanitarian aid,
barely a token gesture for a country that is in desperate need of
billions in overseas financing to stave off bankruptcy.
 Western advocates of arming Ukraine say giving Kiev weapons would
help raise the costs for Putin of pursuing Russia's objectives.
Opponents worry about escalating a conflict that would see NATO and
Russia actively aiding opposing sides in battle, as in the proxy
conflicts of the Cold War.
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"RESISTING THE AGGRESSOR"
Ukraine's Poroshenko called unambiguously for NATO arms in an
interview with a German newspaper.
"The escalation of the conflict that's happening today, the
increasing number of civilian casualties... should move the alliance
to provide Ukraine with more support," Poroshenko told Die Welt.
"(That) includes, among other things, delivering modern weapons for
protection and for resisting the aggressor."
But some NATO members are opposed to sending weapons.
"This is not a solution that could involve the European Union or our
country in the slightest," Italy's Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni
said in a radio interview. The EU should maintain pressure through
sanctions, not weapons, he said.
The rebels have been concentrating their advance on Debaltseve, a
rail hub between their two main strongholds of Donetsk and Luhansk,
where a government garrison has held out despite being nearly
encircled.
On Wednesday, the rebels appeared to have captured Vuhlehirsk, a
nearby small town where government troops had also been holding out.
The army said it was still contesting the town, but Reuters
journalists who reached it saw no sign of areas under army control.
Some of the residents who had not fled the shattered town came out
of cellars where they had been holed up through days of fighting.
Four dead Ukrainian soldiers lay in a garden.
"Someone should come to remove these corpses, it is inhumane to
leave them here to rot," said Sergey Kopun, 50, a metal worker, who
emerged from the cellar where he had sheltered with his wife and
quadriplegic mother.
In Kiev, the military said on Thursday five more soldiers had been
killed and 29 wounded in the past 24 hours. Troops had fended off
two attempts to storm Debaltseve.
The war and years of endemic corruption have brought Ukraine to the
verge of economic collapse and bankruptcy. The central bank
announced a sharp hike in interest rates on Thursday, boosting the
key re-financing rate to 19.5 percent from 14 percent, to stave off
the collapse of the hryvnia currency.
(Additional reporting by Richard Balmforth, Natalia Zinets and Pavel
Polityuk in Kiev, Aleksandar Vasovic in Vuhlehirsk, Isla Binne in
Rome, Stephen Brown and Caroline Copley in Berlin; Writing by
Richard Balmforth and Peter Graff; editing by Anna Willard)
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