The European Union has imposed sanctions on the organizers of rebel elections in eastern Ukraine this month, the bloc said on Saturday, hitting the separatists and their organizations with asset freezes and travel bans.
NATO's planned new fast-reaction force, centerpiece of its response to Russia's annexation of Crimea, is proving harder to set up than expected because of shortages of vital equipment and arguments over funding, diplomats say.
After nine months of non-stop German diplomacy to defuse the crisis in Ukraine, Chancellor Angela Merkel decided in mid-November that a change of tack was needed.
President Vladimir Putin blamed the West for worsening relations with Russia since the Ukraine crisis and said Moscow would not allow itself to become internationally isolated behind another 'Iron Curtain'.
