From RFE/RL's News Desk:
The United States and Russia traded accusations over the conflict in Ukraine at the UN Security Council on February 23.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the Security Council had become a tool to "rubber stamp" decisions made by Western countries.
He accused the United States of "unsavory methods" including what he called "the unconstitutional state coup in Ukraine a year ago."
U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power accused Moscow of violating the UN Charter by training, arming, and fighting alongside separatists who have seized Ukrainian territory.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said Russia had "unleashed a hybrid war" on his country and added that Kyiv might request a UN peacekeeping mission to help maintain a truce in eastern Ukraine.
Lithuania's Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius accused Moscow of trying to redraw Europe's borders by violence and force.
Read more here.
From RFE/RL's News Desk:
German doctors have been allowed to visit a Ukrainian military pilot who has been on hunger strike for more than two months in a Russian jail.
Berlin said it was extremely concerned about the health of Nadia Savchenko and repeated calls for her release.
A Foreign Ministry spokesman said two German doctors visited her on February 15, then held talks with her prison doctors, in which Savchenko was included.
He gave no further details of her condition.
Savchenko is reported to have lost 17 kilograms since going on a water and glucose diet in December.
Savchenko was captured by pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine last June and transported to Russia.
She awaits trial on charges of aiding in the killing of two Russian journalists during the conflict in eastern Ukraine, accusations which she denies.
In Ukraine, Savchenko has become a symbol of resistance to Russian aggression.
From RFE/RL's News Desk:
A Ukrainian military official says Russian-backed rebels have continued attacking government positions in violation of a cease-fire agreement.
In televised comments on February 24, military spokesman Anatoly Stelmakh said separatist forces targeted villages near the strategic town of Debaltseve seven times late on February 23.
Stelmakh said separatists also fired artillery and mortar rounds in three areas near the rebel-held provincial capital of Donetsk and fought government forces for 30 minutes early on February 24 near the Azov Sea coastal city of Mariupol.
A February 12 deal brokered by the leaders of France and Germany required both sides to cease fire and pull heavy weapons back from a separation line, but Ukraine said on February 23 that it could not begin the pullback because rebels were still launching attacks.
Stelmakh repeated that on February 24, saying government forces would begin withdrawing weapons once there is "a complete cease-fire for at least 24 hours."