Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Thursday Britain was "open-minded" about the timescale for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad relinquishing power and did not rule out joining Russia in military action against Islamic State militants.

• January 26, 2017

Russia on Thursday said the British government was staging a show by escorting a Russian aircraft carrier through the English Channel designed to distract attention away from the shortcomings of the British navy.

• January 26, 2017

Ukraine must have a say in any deal struck between Russia and the United States aimed at ending violence in eastern Ukraine, its deputy foreign minister said on Wednesday.

• January 25, 2017

China said on Tuesday it had "irrefutable" sovereignty over disputed islands in the South China Sea after the White House vowed to defend "international territories" in the strategic waterway.

• January 24, 2017

Russia said its war planes had joined forces with Turkish jets for the first time on Wednesday to target Islamic State militants holding the town of al-Bab in northern Syria, evidence of increasingly close cooperation between Moscow and Ankara.

• January 18, 2017

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, in his last major speech before leaving office, described Russia on Wednesday as the biggest threat to the international liberal order and said Washington must work with Europe to stand up to Vladimir Putin.

• January 18, 2017

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday that Moscow was ready to talk to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's new administration about nuclear weapons and Syria, saying the two countries could together solve many of the world's problems.

• January 17, 2017

Some 300 U.S. Marines landed in Norway on Monday for a six-month deployment, the first time since World War Two that foreign troops have been allowed to be stationed there, in a deployment which has irked Norway's Arctic neighbor Russia.

• January 16, 2017