Kiev on Tuesday accused Moscow of sabotaging Ukraine crisis talks, after a meeting in Minsk aimed at resolving the conflict in eastern Ukraine was postponed.
Officials from Ukraine, Russia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) mediator group decided to postpone the meeting with representatives of pro-Russian separatists, OSCE representative Heidi Tagliavini told journalists.

The Russian firm making missiles similar to the one the West claims downed Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 in Ukraine said on Tuesday the passenger jet was likely hit by a BUK missile system.
All 298 passengers and crew on board the Malaysia Airlines jetliner -- the majority of them Dutch -- died when it was shot down over rebel-held eastern Ukraine last year.

The U.S. military released a video Monday of a Russian Su-24 bomber flying past an American warship in the Black Sea to dispel what it called inaccurate media reports about a routine encounter.
In the video, a Su-24 aircraft appears in the distance, then zooms by the USS Ross -- a guided-missile destroyer.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Monday dismissed the "absurdity" of EU complaints over a travel ban imposed by Moscow on 89 Europeans over the Ukraine crisis.
"It is even quite embarrassing to explain the absurdity and awkwardness of such logic as it's an attempt to substitute international law with one's own political biases," Lavrov told reporters in Moscow amid a new spike in tensions with Brussels.

The United Nations said Monday that more than 6,400 people had been killed in conflict-wracked Ukraine, and despite a slowdown in fighting, millions more are suffering from abuses and hardship.
The U.N. human rights office also said there was increasing evidence that Russian servicemen are taking part in the hostilities.

European politicians who discovered they were on a previously confidential Russian travel blacklist said Saturday they were proud of being included, as EU governments led by Germany criticized the entry bans.
The 89-strong list, formerly undisclosed but revealed to European diplomats on Thursday, includes past and serving parliamentarians and ministers who have been outspoken critics of President Vladimir Putin and the war in Ukraine.

When President Barack Obama and other world leaders gather in Germany next week, Russia's Vladimir Putin will be left off the guest list, part of his punishment for more than a year of alleged Kremlin-supported aggression in Ukraine.
But despite vows from Obama and his European counterparts to isolate Putin as long as the crisis in Ukraine remains unresolved, the Russian leader is still a central player in major international affairs, including the U.S.-led nuclear talks with Iran.

Moscow has issued a blacklist of European Union politicians barred from Russia in response to EU sanctions over Crimea and Ukraine, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said on Friday.
"Russia yesterday handed over a list of people to diverse EU embassies who may not enter Russia any longer," Rutte said at a weekly press conference, adding that two Dutch MPs and a Dutch MEP were on the list.

Germany's foreign minister warned on Friday that the situation in Ukraine's separatist east was turning more "fragile" and that negotiators must focus their efforts on averting further deterioration.
Frank-Walter Steinmeier flew into Kiev just days before Ukraine's Western-backed President Petro Poroshenko's personal envoy meets pro-Russian negotiators in the Belarussian capital Minsk for talks aimed at salvaging a February ceasefire agreement.

A Russian woman was in serious condition Friday after her tourist group was hit by lightning as they sheltered under a tree at an archaeological site on Crete, police said.
The 36-year-old woman suffered a heart attack but was revived by medics before being rushed to a local hospital.
