Ukraine's feuding political leaders last night agreed to renounce the use of force and to start talks, in a move that could ease tensions in the crisis that has gripped the country following Sunday's disputed presidential election.

The agreement, announced last night by President Leonid Kuchma, came after more than two hours of negotiations in Kiev's glittering Mariyinsky Palace with international mediators, headed by Javier Solana, the European Union foreign policy chief, Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski, and Boris Gryzlov, Russian President Vladimir Putin's representative.