From the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, addressing Moscow:
Red Cross's confirmations:
From AFP on the gas battle that Russia appears to be waging, quietly, via Gazprom:
Slovak gas importer SPP on Thursday said its Russian gas deliveries were still down by half of what they should be, even as Gazprom insisted levels had remained constant.
"Our company today reports again a roughly 50 percent drop in gas deliveries," SPP spokesman Petr Bednar said in a statement, confirming a second consecutive day of cuts.
Slovakia, which is heavily dependent on Russian energy, recently began pumping gas to Ukraine at the European Union's behest, after Russia cut off supplies to the conflict-ridden country.
Bratislava's involvement has not gone over well in Moscow, and already last month Slovakia saw its gas deliveries from Russia's state-owned Gazprom dip by up to 20 percent.
"There is enough gas in Europe, but unfortunately, it is being used as a political weapon," Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico told reporters Thursday.
From our newsroom on the Red Cross shelling:
An employee of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has been killed by shelling in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk.
A local rescue worker, Andriy Lyvchenko, told AFP that the Red Cross worker was killed on October 2 when a shell hit the ICRC office building in Donetsk.
Pro-Russian separatists control Donetsk and the self-described Defense Ministry of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic said the Red Cross worker was a Swiss national.
Images circulated appearing to show a Swiss passport.
It was not immediately clear who launched the attack.
Fighting has intensified since October 1 near Donetsk's airport as separatists have attempted to seize control of the facility from government forces.
Ukraine's military said on October 2 that separatists were continuing an offensive they began the previous day on "a broad front."
The airport has been a focus of fighting between government forces and the separatists despite a September 5 cease-fire deal.
Ukrainian military spokesman Vladyslav Seleznyov said government forces repelled four attacks on the airport in the evening of October 1, destroying a tank and killing seven rebels.
Seleznyov said the separatists used tanks, multiple-launch rocket systems, artillery, and mortars during the overnight attack and when they resumed their assault on the morning of October 2.
Aleksandr Zakharchenko, who calls himself the prime minister of the "Donetsk People's Republic," was quoted as saying on October 1 that separatist forces control “90 percent of the airport's territory” and plan to have it fully under their control “in two or three days at most."
Three people were reported killed on October 1 when a shell exploded on a school playground, while several others died when a shell hit a minivan on a nearby street.
The blasts occurred as pupils returned to school after the start of the school year was postponed from September 1 due to fighting.
Meanwhile, diplomatic pressure on Russia continued as German Chancellor Angela Merkel told Russian President Vladimir Putin via phone on October 1 that Moscow has a duty to exert influence on the separatists in Ukraine.
According to a German government spokesman, the two leaders expressed concerned that violence was still being used in Ukraine every day.
Merkel said the border between Ukraine and Russia needed to be monitored and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) had a big role to play in that.
Based on reporting by Reuters, AFP, and Interfax