BREAKING: According to the agencies, talks are under way in Minsk. It's still unclear who exactly is taking part.
The latest from our news desk on the Minsk talks:
Representatives from Ukraine, Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and pro-Russian separatists are meeting in Minsk for fresh talks on the Ukraine conflict as the death toll from the fighting between government troops and pro-Russian rebels continues to mount.
Former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, Russia's Ambassador to Ukraine Mikhail Zurabov, and OSCE representative Heidi Tagliavini were holding talks with two representatives from the rebel-held areas in eastern Ukraine.
Russian news agency Interfax had quoted an unnamed source as saying that Kuchma had requested that the separatist leaders who had signed the previous agreement in Minsk in September -- Aleksandr Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnytsky -- should take part in the talks.
But Denis Pushilin, one of the two representatives of the separatists in Minsk, told journalists in Minsk that Zakharchenko and Plotnytsky are "fully occupied dealing" with the consequences of the Ukrainian bombardments.
He said the two will attend peace talks only after Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko declares an immediate cease-fire and pulls back heavy weaponry.
OSCE officials said they hoped for a "binding" truce that would allow an "unrestricted supply of basic goods" as well as humanitarian aid to go to the people most affected by the fighting.
Plans for the negotiations in the Belarusian capital Minsk were announced on January 29, raising hopes of dialogue after the collapse of a September truce in the nine-month war that has killed more than 5,100 people, according to the United Nations.
But the meeting, agreed initially for January 30, was postponed due to differences over who should represent the rebel camp.
The latest efforts to jumpstart the peace talks came amid an escalation in the fighting in eastern Ukraine after pro-Russian insurgents on January 23 pulled out of negotations, announcing the start of an offensive designed to expand their control over the southeast.
On January 30, they also warned that if the talks failed, they would not halt their actions.
"Should the negotiations collapse...the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics reserve the right to pursue their offensive until the entire Donetsk and Luhansk regions are freed" of Ukrainian troops, the rebel regions' main negotiators said in a joint statement.
The statement said the rebels were prepared to withdraw heavy weaponry from the frontline if the Ukrainian army did the same.
But they also said that the new border outlining rebel-held territory should run along the current front, giving them an area around 500 square kilometers larger than lines agreed in September.
The latest violence has alarmed Ukraine's Western allies, with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announcing plans to visiti Kyiv on February 5 for talks with President Petro Poroshenko and Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk.
On January 31, Ukrainian officials said 15 troops and three civilians had been killed over the past 24 hours.
Defense Minister Stepan Poltorak told journalists the soldiers death toll was for the entire frontline of fighting and was the highest single-day number of deaths since the cease-fire was signed in September.
Fighting is raging around the strategic Ukrainian-controlled transport hub of Debaltseve, some 50 kilometers northeast of the rebel stronghold of Donetsk.
Two civilians were killed in Debaltseve overnight amid intense fighting between the Ukrainian army and the pro-Russian rebels for control of the city, according to Donetsk regional police chief Vyacheslav Abroskin's Facebook account.
Abroskin also said a civilian was killed west of the city of Donetsk.
Rebel leader Zakharchenko has told Russian state television that Ukrainian troops in the town were "surrounded" and unable to receive supplies or send their wounded for treatment in regional hospitals.
Western governments and Ukraine accuse Russia of arming and training the rebels, who are deploying sophisticated and heavy weaponry, including dozens of tanks and multiple-rocket launchers.
Russia denies aiding the rebels.
The 28-nation EU on January 29 extended through September a first wave of targeted sanctions it had imposed on Moscow and Crimean leaders in the wake of Russia's March seizure of the Black Sea peninsula from Ukraine.
EU foreign ministers also agreed to start work on further "appropriate action" if Moscow and the rebels continued breaching the original terms of the collapsed September truce.
BREAKING: The Ukrainian envoy to the peace talks in Minsk, former President Leonid Kuchma, has said the talks ended "in failure."
He said separatist representatives at the talks refused to discuss a plan for a cease-fire.
More from our news desk on the failed talks:
Peace talks in Minsk aimed at ending the fighting in eastern Ukraine ended without progress on January 31.
Ukraine's representative at the talks, former President Leonid Kuchma, told Interfax that the two separatist representatives at the talks issued ultimatums and refused to discuss a plan "for a quick cease-fire and a pullback of heavy weapons."
The more than four hours of talks, held at the Belarusian Foreign Ministry building, included Russian Ambassador to Ukraine Mikhail Zurabov, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe representative Heidi Tagliavini, and rebel representatives Denis Pushilin and Vladislav Deinego.
Pushilin, for his part, said the separatists will reject ultimatums and accused Ukraine of blocking the peace process.
Kuchma also criticized the two main self-proclaimed separatist leaders in eastern Ukraine -- Aleksandr Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnitsky -- for not attending the talks as signatories of the original Minsk agreements signed in September.
Barring any major developments, that ends the live blogging for today.
LATEST: The Ukrainian army says 13 of its soldiers have been killed in fighting in eastern Ukraine in the past 24 hours.