Pro-Russian rebels paraded European monitors they are holding in eastern Ukraine yesterday, freeing one but saying they had no plans to release another seven as the US and Europe prepared new sanctions against Moscow.

US President Barack Obama and Western allies moved to indefinitely cut Moscow out of a major international coalition today, including cancelling an economic summit Russian President Vladimir Putin was to host this summer.

Vietnamese authorities searching waters for a missing Boeing 777 airliner have spotted an object that they suspect is one of the plane’s doors.

US President Barack Obama will meet Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk at the White House on Wednesday.

President Barack Obama has cancelled plans to meet Russian president Vladimir Putin, a rare diplomatic snub and retribution for Russia’s decision to grant temporary asylum to secrets whistleblower Edward Snowden.

President Barack Obama is paying tribute to the man who inspired his political activism by taking his family on a tour of the island prison where anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela spent 18 years.

The United States is considering a no-fly zone in Syria, potentially its first direct intervention into the two-year-old civil war, Western diplomats said, after the White House said Syria had crossed a “red line” by using nerve gas.

Thirteen bound corpses, many apparently shot execution-style, have been discovered in eastern Syria, days after the massacre of more than 100 people provoked international outrage.

US President Barack Obama told Russia’s leader he would pursue further nuclear arms cuts with Russia, but would have more flexibility after the November election to deal with the contentious issue.

President Barack Obama will make his case for US involvement in Libya to an anxious American public tonight.

US president George W Bush yesterday hailed the deaths of Saddam Hussein’s two sons as the clearest sign yet that “the former regime is gone and will not be coming back.”