President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday Russia would add more than 40 new intercontinental ballistic missiles to its nuclear arsenal this year and a defense official accused NATO of provoking a new arms race.
Stationing heavy U.S. military equipment in the Baltic states and eastern Europe would amount to "the most aggressive step by the Pentagon and NATO" since the Cold War, Interfax news agency quoted a Russian Defense Ministry official as saying on Monday.
Italy stepped up calls for a change to European asylum rules on Sunday as neighboring states tightened border controls, turning back African migrants and leaving hundreds stranded at the frontier in northern Italy.
Ukraine protested to Russia on Saturday after mobs vandalized its embassy in Moscow and its consulate in Rostov-on-Don overnight, a day after Russia made a similar protest to Ukraine over damage to the Russian consulate in Kharkiv.
Likely Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said on Wednesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin was a "bully" and the United States and its allies in Europe should be resolute in responding to Russian aggression.
President Vladimir Putin will be on the lookout for signs of dissent over European Union sanctions on Russia when he visits Italy on Wednesday, but he is likely to be disappointed.
A separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine is revealing increasing evidence, but not yet conclusive legal proof, of Russian state involvement, senior United Nations human rights officials said on Monday.
French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to rapidly implement measures agreed under the Feb.12 Minsk ceasefire, Hollande's office said in a statement.
From his hospital bed in the Ukrainian capital, Russian fighter Alexander Alexandrov feels abandoned by his country, its leaders and even the local Russian consul.
Russia's army is massing troops and hundreds of pieces of weaponry including mobile rocket launchers, tanks and artillery at a makeshift base near the border with Ukraine, a Reuters reporter saw this week.
Germany formally protested to Russia on Monday over Moscow's refusal to let a conservative German lawmaker into the country, a decision the Foreign Ministry criticized as unacceptable amid East-West tensions over the Ukraine crisis.
Ukraine on Monday accused two Russian servicemen it said it had captured of being part of a special forces group that had killed and wounded Ukrainian servicemen in fighting in its eastern regions and said they would be prosecuted for "terrorist acts".
Pope Francis' hard-hitting criticisms of localization and inequality long ago set him out as a leader unafraid of mixing theology and politics. He is now flexing the Vatican's diplomatic muscles as well.
Russian land forces will join troops from China, India, Mongolia and Belarus in a series of joint military training exercises during the second half of this year, President Vladimir Putin's office said on Wednesday.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called for a halt to fighting around the Ukrainian coastal town of Shyrokyne on Wednesday as NATO backed his demand that Russia fully implement a Ukraine ceasefire agreement.
At least 220 Russian soldiers have been killed in east Ukraine, opposition activists said on Tuesday in a report offering what they called "ample evidence" to rebut President Vladimir Putin's denial his troops are fighting there.
The former Soviet republics of Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine are moving inexorably from the orbit of a Russian state that promotes values fundamentally alien to its neighbors, according to Georgia's president.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry hopes to explore Russia's willingness to curb its involvement in Ukraine and its support for Syria's president at talks on Tuesday with President Vladimir Putin.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will discuss the Ukraine crisis and other global conflicts on Tuesday in Russia's Black Sea resort of Sochi, RIA news agency quoted a diplomatic source as saying.
China has invited Russian troops to march in a parade in Beijing in September to commemorate the end of World War Two, the Defence Ministry said on Monday, a move likely to further put off Western leaders from attending.
