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London (AFP) - Oil prices surged close to $100 per barrel Tuesday as major crude producer Russia prepared to send troops into two breakaway regions of Ukraine, sparking Western nations to ready economic sanctions against Moscow.

Australia will expand cyber training for Ukrainian officials and could join a broader coalition of Western countries to provide the besieged Eastern European nation with support as fear of a Russian invasion continues.

Russian-backed rebels and Ukrainian forces traded accusations on Thursday that each had fired across the ceasefire line in eastern Ukraine, raising alarm at a time when Western countries have warned of the possibility of a Russian invasion any day.

Video footage of tanks and other armoured vehicles being loaded onto railway flatcars raised hopes on Tuesday morning that Russia may be dialling down plans to invade Ukraine.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has accused Western states of “tampering with the text and playing for time” at the Vienna negotiations aimed at reviving the Iran nuclear deal. However, he said that arriving at a good deal was at hand. For his part, Ali Shamkhani, the secretary of Iran’s…

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday his country would continue to seek membership of the NATO transatlantic military alliance despite pressure to cede that aspiration to avoid war with Russia. Ukraine's envoy to Britain had suggested Kyiv may reconsider its NATO bid but later backtracked while acknowledging concessions could…

Berlin (AFP) - Western leaders on Friday vowed to take "swift and deep sanctions" against Moscow should Russia march on Ukraine, Berlin said after talks, as Washington warned that a Russian invasion could be just days away.

An annual report from the United Nations labor agency has highlighting the work conditions of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in China’s western Xinjiang region

Russia and Belarus launched joint military drills on Thursday, scheduled to continue until February 20. The exercises have raised concerns in Western countries, with fears that Moscow is plotting a major escalation in the conflict in Ukraine. Follow the day's events as they unfolded.

Russia and Belarus launched joint military drills Thursday despite concerns in Western countries that Moscow is plotting a major escalation of the conflict in Ukraine. The exercises, scheduled to continue until February 20 in Belarus, had begun and would center around "suppressing and repelling external aggression," Russia's defense ministry said…

MOSCOW — In May 1993, Estonia’s first post-Soviet leader Lennart Meri — a wise man with bitter experience of life in the Soviet Union — told the visiting U.S. deputy secretary of state that Estonia urgently needed to join NATO. It was, he said, the only guarantee that Russia wouldn’t…