Global 'Elders' call for compliance with Minsk agreement:
Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev has met with former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and other prominent former global leaders in Moscow.
The visit on April 29 by the group called The Elders comes as Russia's relations with the West are severely strained over Moscow's seizure of Crimea and the deadly conflict in eastern Ukraine.
A spokesperson for Gorbachev said, "All those involved in the discussion were unanimous that the most important thing now is to ensure compliance by all parties with the Minsk agreements," signed in February in the Belarusian capital.
The Elders were also expected to meet on April 29 with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters the meeting was not organized because of the heightened tension, saying the group's focus was on "conceptual discussions about the future of global relations."
But he said that "the current turbulent situation is just another reason to hold such a meeting," he said.
The Elders, brought together by Nelson Mandela in 2007 and now chaired by Annan, call themselves "an independent group of global leaders who work together for peace and human rights." (Interfax, TASS)
Here's an update from our news desk on the situation in Chornobyl:
Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk says firefighters have contained a large forest fire burning near the abandoned Chornobyl nuclear power plant.
Yatsenyuk, told a government meeting today that, "as of 12:45 p.m. [local time], the fires have been localized and contained. Radiation levels are normal."
The blaze in woodlands, parts of which are still contaminated by radioactive particles from the 1986 Chornobyl disaster, had raised fears of increased radiation in Ukraine and neighboring Belarus as high winds pushed it towards the plant about 20 kilometers.
Emergency services deployed more than 300 firefighters, three planes, and one helicopter to battle the blaze, which Yatsenyuk said was the largest in Ukraine since 1992.
An explosion followed by a fire at Chornobyl's Reactor Number 4 on April 26, 1986, sent radiation across Europe.
The stricken reactor is covered by a concrete casement.
A new steel covering is being built in a long-delayed project now expected to be finished by late 2017.