Irishman David O’Sullivan will be the EU’s ambassador to Washington for the next five years, in a post previously held by former taoiseach John Bruton.

Iran and six world powers are in “50 to 60% agreement” on the shape of a nuclear deal meant to crimp any potential Iranian attempt to build nuclear arms in exchange for an end to crippling economic sanctions, the country’s foreign minister said.

US reluctance to engage militarily with Russia in the past suggests it would be well-advised to back off and give the lead role in the Crimea crisis to a group of EU leaders, writes Anne-Marie Slaughter.

Ukraine issued an arrest warrant yesterday for its ousted pro-Russian president over “mass murder” and appealed for $35bn (€25bn) in Western aid as Moscow denounced Kiev’s new reformist interim government as “Kalashnikov-toting people in black masks.”

Russia has questioned the authority of Ukraine’s acting government, with prime minister Dmitry Medvedev saying the country’s acting authorities have come to power as a result of an ’armed mutiny’.

EU foreign ministers, including Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore, are expected to agree to action such as visa bans, assets freezes and possibly weapons bans when they meet in emergency session on Ukraine today.

The European Union is calling an extraordinary meeting of foreign ministers to decide the 28-nation bloc’s reaction including possible sanctions to the recent escalation of violence in Ukraine.

Troops from several EU countries will begin deploying in the strife-torn Central African Republic next month, a French official said yesterday.

Ukraine’s opposition called for international mediation and appealed for Western financial aid for the first time in their protests against the president Viktor Yanukovych yesterday.

Ukrainian police have opened an investigation into the kidnapping of an opposition activist, who said he was held captive for more than a week and tortured.

As Ukraine’s hard-line pro-Moscow prime minister and his government resigned, Russian president Vladimir Putin says that he will still provide the country with the $15bn (€11bn) bailout as agreed.

Iran has started to shut down its most sensitive nuclear work as part of a landmark deal struck with world powers, state media said today.

Russian president Vladimir Putin made a new attempt to woo Ukraine yesterday after the European Union and United States stepped up efforts to pull Kiev out of its former Soviet master’s orbit.

The withdrawal of riot police from two areas in Ukraine’s capital is raising opposition hopes that three weeks of escalating protests have begun to erode police support for President Viktor Yanukovych and his government.

Anti-government protesters in Ukraine are claiming victory after riot police backed down from a showdown in Kiev’s main square.

Hundreds of police have stormed a protest camp in the Ukrainian capital, clashing with protesters as they tried to dismantle barricades.

Ukraine’s president has promised to try to release some demonstrators arrested in recent protests against him, in a bid to defuse the country’s tensions.

Top Western diplomats headed to Kiev today to try to defuse a stand-off between Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s government and thousands of demonstrators, following a night in which police in riot gear dismantled protesters’ encampments outside government buildings.

Thousands of protesters poured into Kiev’s Independence Square last night, the centre of Ukraine’s pro-West Orange Revolution, to demand that the government reverse course and sign a landmark agreement with the European Union.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and foreign ministers of other major powers converged today to lend their weight to the Iran nuclear talks after envoys reported progress on key issues blocking an interim agreement to curb the Iranian programme in return for limited sanctions relief.

France raised questions today about whether a proposed deal to temporarily curb Iran’s nuclear programme goes far enough, complicating negotiations with the Iranians and casting doubt on whether an agreement could be reached during the current round of negotiations in Switzerland.

US secretary of state John Kerry and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton are meeting as they prepare for another day of nuclear negotiations with Iran.

US secretary of state John Kerry is flying to Geneva, Switzerland, to join six world powers for talks on Iran’s nuclear programmes, in a last-minute decision that suggests a deal could be imminent.

The Government has not been given any information on whether the US National Security Agency has been spying on Ireland, but it has warned that eavesdropping on phones is not acceptable.

Iran’s new president has called on Israel to join an international treaty banning the spread of nuclear weapons, chiding the Jewish state for being the only Middle East nation that has failed to do so.

European Union officials have agreed that the August 21 chemical attack outside Damascus appears to have been the work of Syria’s regime, but that any potential military attack against it should wait for the UN inspectors’ report.

Political reaction in Ireland to the escalating Syrian crisis remains opposed to military intervention, despite the rising civilian death toll and suggestions that Britain might back air raids against military targets without the agreement of the UN.

The EU's foreign ministers have agreed to suspend the supply of military weapons to the Egyptian government.

Deposed Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi is safe and well, according to the EU’s top diplomat who has been his first contact with the outside world.

The European Union’s top diplomat has had two hours of talks with Egypt’s ousted president, who has been held incommunicado since his overthrow in a July 3 military coup, the EU said today.

Iran will be ready to resume nuclear talks with world powers as soon as the country’s president-elect puts together his negotiating team, the foreign minister has said.

Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore has deemed goods from Israeli settlements in the West Bank should be treated as illegal.

The European Union is considering trade action against Bangladesh, which has preferential access to EU markets for its garments, in order to pressure Dhaka to improve safety standards after a building collapse killed hundreds of factory workers.

Six nations have started talks with Iran in an attempt to satisfy both Tehran’s demands for international recognition of its right to advanced nuclear technology and world concerns that the Islamic Republic wants to misuse that expertise to make atomic arms.

London and Paris are seeking to lift an EU embargo to enable them to arm Syrian rebels, said the French foreign minister.

President Bashar Assad called on Syrians to defend their country against religious extremists seeking to destroy the nation, dismissing any prospect of dialogue with the “murderous criminals” he says are behind the uprising.

A defiant president Bashar al-Assad presented what he described as an initiative yesterday to end the war in Syria, but his opponents dismissed it as a ploy to cling to power.

The UN General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution welcoming positive changes in Burma but expressing serious concern at an upsurge of sectarian violence between Muslims and Buddhists in strife-torn Rakhine state.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief said today that more sanctions against Syria and Iran are being weighed.

The EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton has called for a rapid appointment by the UN and the Arab League of a successor to Kofi Annan.

Iran is willing to continue talks with world powers over its nuclear programme until they reach a conclusion, a senior Iranian official said today in a report by the semi-official ISNA news agency.

Facing mounting international outrage over the killing of at least 109 people in the restive town of Houla, Syria yesterday accused rebels of carrying out the massacre, in which dozens of children were murdered.

The Reuters photographs of lines of bodies at Ali Bin al-Hussein’s mosque in Huola in Syria put our debate about this week’s EU referendum into perspective.

Iranian negotiators have rejected proposals by six world powers to curb Tehran’s nuclear programme.