European Union foreign ministers said on Monday there were no grounds to lift economic sanctions against Russia despite conciliatory proposals from the EU's foreign policy chief as violence intensified in eastern Ukraine.

• January 19, 2015

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu accused his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday of terrorism and said Israeli "provocations" such as the bombardment of Gaza were contributing to radicalization in the Muslim world.

• January 17, 2015

A top NATO official said on Friday it was the wrong time to talk about mending relations with Russia, but EU chief Jean-Claude Juncker sounded more conciliatory, saying the bloc must begin to engage with Moscow again in areas of common interest.

• January 17, 2015

Russian is concerned that a rotation by Kiev of front-line forces in eastern Ukraine could undermine peace efforts, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday.

• January 16, 2015

Russia is working to develop within a few years the capability to threaten several neighbors at once on the scale of its present operation in Ukraine, a senior American general said.

• January 16, 2015

Elkhan Nuriyev,
EGF Affiliated Expert

The mounting tension over Ukraine has introduced numerous dangers to the security situation in the South Caucasus. These negative ramifications are further exacerbated by the fact that Russia holds the key to resolving conflicts in the post-Soviet realm, especially in the absence of greater Western assertiveness. But Moscow and Brussels are caught up in geopolitical competition over the region. READ MORE

• January 16, 2015

Lithuania is publishing a manual to advise its citizens on how to survive a war on its soil as concerns grow that Russia's intervention in Ukraine heralds increased assertiveness in its tiny Baltic neighbors.

• January 15, 2015

Bulgaria said on Wednesday it would extend a barbed wire fence along its border with Turkey by a further 130 km (80 miles) in an attempt to prevent a growing number of refugees, mainly from Syria, entering the European Union member state.

• January 14, 2015