KIEV: Ukraine’s new Western-backed president on Friday released a sweeping peace plan for curbing a pro-Russian uprising in the separatist east that is threatening the ex-Soviet country’s survival.

The 14-point initiative’s publication followed two calls made by President Petro Poroshenko to Vladimir Putin within 72 hours in the belief that no truce could work without the suport of the Russian strongman.

Poroshenko on Thursday also hosted more than a dozen mayors and tycoons from the eastern rustbelt to help win their backing for his plan to try to end 10 weeks of fighting that has killed at least 365 civilians and fighters on both sides.

A Ukranian military spokesman said on Friday the latest clashes in the east had claimed the lives of seven soldiers and left 30 wounded.

Kiev media published photographs of the document Poroshenko planned to unveil later Friday that demands that the rebels disarm and promises to decentralize power through constitutional reform.

The plan drops criminal charges against fighters who committed no “serious crimes” and provides “a guaranteed corridor for Russian and Ukrainian mercenaries to leave” the conflict zone.

And it establishes a 10-kilometer (six mile) border buffer zone to stem the flow of gunmen and military equipment that both Kiev and Washington claim have been flooding in from Russia in recent weeks.

But it also calls on “local government bodies to resume their operations” — a demand rejected by separatist leaders who have proclaimed their independence from Kiev and occupied administration buildings in about a dozen cities and towns in the east.

One rebel commander this week dismissed as “meaningless” news that Poroshenko was about to propose a strategy for ending the country’s worst crisis in its post-Soviet history.

The plan is officially called “Steps toward a peaceful settlement of the situation in eastern Ukrainian regions” and is intended to stay in force for 10 days from the moment Poroshenko declares a unilateral cease-fire.

Poroshenko promised on Wednesday to order his troops to halt their eastern campaign within a matter of days.

But he also argued that a long-lasting peace could only be established once the 2,000-kilometer (1,200-mile) land border with Russia is fully sealed — a job acting Defense Minister Mykhailo Koval said his forces had just accomplished. “Our troops have completely surrounded the troubled regions and restored the state border’s control,” Koval told parliament.

Putin had earlier bowed to Western pressure and refused to recognize the independence proclaimed by the eastern Donetsk and Lugansk regions in the wake of disputed May 11 sovereignty referendums.

But he has lobbied for Kiev to turn Ukraine into a federation that provides regional leaders with the right to draft laws and established independent trade relations with nations such as Russia.

Estonian Prime Minister Taavi Roivas urged NATO on Friday to establish a permanent presence in the Baltic state in response to Russia’s actions in Ukraine, telling his allies to “open your eyes and stay awake.”

The Western alliance has tripled the number of fighter jets based in the Baltics as part of measures to beef up its defenses in eastern Europe following Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

The events in eastern Ukraine, where Russian-speaking insurgents using sophisticated weapons threaten to split the country, have put the whole former Soviet bloc region on alert and eager for NATO reassurance.