Germany said on Thursday it was sending 20 police officers to the border between Hungary and Serbia to help control a surge in the number of asylum seekers heading into the European Union and ultimately to Germany with its generous welfare benefits.
Representatives of the contact group on the Ukraine crisis said no agreement had yet been reached on a ceasefire in talks in Minsk on Tuesday, denying a report by Russia's TASS news agency that a deal had been reached.
Germany said on Monday there was "zero" chance of it paying World War Two reparations to Athens, following a renewed demand from Greece's new leftist Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
President Barack Obama said on Monday that revelations of U.S. surveillance on German Chancellor Angela Merkel "damaged impressions" Germans hold of the U.S. government.
