World

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — Hundreds of people may have been killed in a suspected Boko Haram attack on four villages in northeast Nigeria, a local lawmaker and residents said on Thursday.

Gunmen in military uniform struck the Gwoza district of Borno state late on Tuesday, razing homes, churches and mosques, and killing residents who tried to flee the violence.

Some community leaders put the death toll in the attacks as high as 400 to 500, although there was no independent verification of the claim because of poor communications and difficulties by the emergency services in accessing the area.

If confirmed, the attack on the villages of Goshe, Attagara, Agapalwa and Aganjara would be one of the deadliest in the Islamists’ deadly five-year insurgency, and top the more than 300 who were killed on May 5 when militant fighters laid siege to the nearby town of Gamboru Ngala.

“The killings are massive but nobody can give a toll for now because nobody has been able to go to that place because the insurgents are still there. They have taken over the whole area,” lawmaker Peter Biye told AFP.

“There are bodies littered over the whole area and people have fled,” added Biye, who represents Gwoza in Nigeria’s lower chamber of parliament, the House of Representatives.

‘Hundreds of bodies’ 

Reports from the remote region, said the insurgents continued their attack on Wednesday, stealing livestock and food, and burning property.

“Hundreds of dead bodies are lying there... because there is nobody that will bury them,” said one community leader in Attagara, who requested anonymity.

He said the attackers only spared women and that young boys were “snatched from the backs of their mothers and killed”.

Men, women and children fled the villages but gunmen on motorcycles tracked them down, shooting as they ran, he added.

Gwoza shares a border with Cameroon and is surrounded by mountains and the Sambisa forest, a known Boko Haram base and the focus for a Nigerian military search for more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped on April 14.

Many people fled across the border, as soldiers were deployed to fight the heavily armed Islamists, who took over at least seven villages hoisting their black flag, Biye said on Wednesday.

The community leader called the situation a grave “humanitarian crisis” while others called for relief agencies to be allowed in to enable the dead to be buried.

Another, Zakari Habu, said: “The women and elderly men in our villages also need food and water. The injured need drugs and all of them need shelter.”

A revenge attack 

Military jets bombarded Boko Haram positions in the affected area to try to flush out the insurgents, Biye said on Wednesday.

In mainly Muslim Goshe, where the entire village of about 300 homes was razed with several mosques, local resident Abba Goni said “at least 100 people were killed”.

Bulus Yashi, who lives in predominantly Christian Attagara, said the attack seemed to be a reprisal after four Boko Haram gunmen were killed after they opened fire on a church, killing nine.

Another attack on May 25 had been repelled, killing seven Boko Haram gunmen, he said.

“We believed they came on a revenge mission,” he said.

Residents had allegedly sought assurances from the military that they would be protected from reprisals over Sunday’s church attack but they claimed that no troops were sent.

There was no immediate word from the local military, police or state government when contacted by AFP.

Boko Haram Islamists have recently stepped up raids in northern Borno state near the borders with Cameroon, Chad and Niger, pillaging villages, looting food stores and killing residents.

The attacks are generally seen as response to villagers forming civilian vigilante groups against Boko Haram, who in turn accuse locals of helping the Nigerian military’s counter-insurgency.

Civilians have increasingly been targets of the violence and more than 2,000 are estimated to have been killed this year alone.

In February, the United Nations said that nearly 300,000 people, more than half of them children, had fled their homes in northeast Nigeria since a state of emergency was imposed in May last year.

BRUSSELS — The United States and its allies used the first Group of Seven (G-7) meeting without Russia in 17 years to condemn Moscow’s actions in Ukraine and threaten hard-hitting sanctions if President Vladimir Putin does not help restore stability.

Meeting in Brussels rather than the Black Sea resort of Sochi — a snub to Russia which was supposed to have hosted the G-8 — Western powers and Japan delivered strong rhetoric, even if the EU’s commitment to further sanctions remains in doubt.

“We are united in condemning the Russian Federation’s continuing violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” the United States, Germany, Japan, France, Britain, Italy and Canada said in a joint statement.

“Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, and actions to destabilise eastern Ukraine, are unacceptable and must stop.”

That message was reinforce by President Barack Obama, who said Russia’s economy was already suffering and would only suffer more if Putin did not change behaviour.

“If Russia’s provocations continue, it’s clear from our discussions here that the G-7 nations are ready to impose additional costs on Russia,” he said. “Today, in contrast to a growing global economy, a sluggish Russian economy is even weaker because of the choices made by Russia’s leadership.”

Putin, who will meet Germany’s Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Britain’s David Cameron on the sidelines of 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings in France on Friday, appeared unfazed by the threats.

Asked at an event in St. Petersburg how he felt about being excluded from the G-8 for the first time since joining the club in 1997, Putin was typically pointed, barely breaking stride to speak to Kremlin reporters as he left a meeting.

“I would like to wish them bon appetit,” he said, before walking away swiftly.

It appears unlikely that Obama and Putin will talk in France.

“Should we have the opportunity to talk, I will be repeating the same message that I’ve been delivering to him throughout this crisis,” Obama said.

Widespread condemnation

With Putin not at the table, the G-7 leaders chose to criticise Russia either by name or implicitly for its actions on several fronts, including Syria and energy policy.

On Syria, the G-7 “deplored” a decision by Russia and China to veto a draft UN Security Council resolution involving crimes committed by both sides in the conflict, and on energy policy it highlighted the problem of countries using energy as a weapon.

“The use of energy supplies as a means of political coercion or as a threat to security is unacceptable,” the statement said.

Since Russia supplies around a third of Europe’s gas and oil needs, and has threatened to cut off supplies to and through Ukraine if it does not settle outstanding bills, the reference was clearly directed at Moscow.

Yet despite efforts to present a united front against Russia’s seizure of Crimea and its tacit support for actions in eastern Ukraine, there remain chinks in the G-7’s armour when it comes to hitting where it hurts.

France, which has come under pressure from the United States to cancel a contract to sell Russia two Mistral warships, appeared to win the argument, with Obama acknowledging that the deal would probably go ahead despite his objections.

Merkel also gave Hollande support, saying that since the EU was not yet ready to impose tougher economic sanctions against Russia, there was no reason for France to cancel contract.

Japan, which geopolitically has less interest in Ukraine, struck a conciliatory note, saying dialogue with Russia remained the best approach.

“I want Russia to be involved in various issues concerning the international community in a constructive manner,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said. “That’s what the world desires too. To this end I’m hoping to continue dialogue with President Putin.”

EU leaders said they would closely monitor Russia’s actions over the coming weeks and take a decision at a summit at the end of June on whether there was a need for further measures.

“Should events so require, we stand ready to intensify targeted sanctions and to consider additional measures,” said European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, who chairs EU summits and coordinates the position of EU member states.

“The European Council will assess the situation at the end of June. The day after tomorrow in France individual G-7 leaders will convey this message to President Putin.”

HONG KONG/BEIJING — Tens of thousands of people held a candlelight vigil in Hong Kong on Wednesday to mark the bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters 25 years ago in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, while mainland China authorities sought to whitewash the 1989 event.

In Beijing, police flooded the streets around the square, scene of the worst of the violence a quarter of a century ago, and censors scrubbed the Internet clean of any mention of the rare open display of defiance against the Communist Party.

In Hong Kong, which returned to Chinese rule in 1997 but remains a free-wheeling, capitalist hub, demonstrators holding candles and clad mainly in black gathered in a downtown park and called on Beijing to atone for the killings.

A large number of mainland Chinese also flocked to commemorate the crackdown in the former British territory, where a vigil has been held every year since the massacre. Organisers said some 180,000 people took part on Wednesday evening.

“Hong Kong is a free society where you can speak out. In China, the Communist Party dictates everything,” said Chen Jing Gen, in his 60s, who travelled from the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen to attend the vigil.

“People in mainland China are mostly aware of June 4, but due to the control of the party
no one dares to talk about it.”

The United States led international calls for China to account for what happened on June 4, 1989. The comments riled China, which has said the protest movement was “counterrevolutionary”.

Exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama also used the anniversary to call on China to embrace democracy.

China has never released a death toll from the crackdown after troops shot their way into central Beijing, but estimates from human rights groups and witnesses range from several hundred to several thousand.

Public discussion of Tiananmen is forbidden in China and online references to it are heavily censored, leaving many of the country’s youth ignorant of what happened.

“I had never heard of the Tiananmen incident until I was studying in the United States when I was 18,” said a 25-year-old woman surnamed Lan, who was visiting Hong Kong from Beijing.

Security blanket

In mainland China, police, soldiers and plainclothes security personnel enveloped Tiananmen Square, checking identity cards and rummaging through bags looking for any hint that people might try to commemorate the anniversary.

Police escorted a Reuters reporter off the square, which was thronging with tourists, saying it was closed to foreign media.

Police also detained another Reuters journalist for trying to report on the anniversary in one of Beijing’s university districts, releasing him after a few hours.

Rights group Amnesty International has said at least 66 people had been detained in the period leading up to the anniversary.

“They have covered up history. They don’t want people to know the truth of what they did,” veteran activist Hu Jia told Reuters from his home in Beijing, where he said police were present to prevent him from leaving.

“Nobody would have confidence in them if they knew what they did... They should have fallen because of what they did,” he added, speaking by mobile telephone.

China’s foreign ministry on Tuesday defended the crackdown, saying the government had chosen the correct path for the sake of the people.

The protests began in April 1989 as a demonstration by university students in Beijing to mourn the death of Hu Yaobang, the reformist Communist Party chief who had been ousted by paramount leader Deng Xiaoping. They grew into broader demands for an end to corruption as well as calls for democracy.

Many Chinese would balk at the idea of mass revolution today. China is now the world’s second biggest economy, with most Chinese enjoying individual and economic freedoms never accorded them before.

“I don’t think it can happen again,” said a Beijing resident who gave his family name as Xu. “China’s system is certainly different from the West. The population is huge, 1.4 billion people. If you want to govern it well, it’s not easy.”

But Wu’er Kaixi, a leading figure in the pro-democracy movement of 1989, told Reuters that Chinese people could rise up once more against the Communist Party in anger at anything from graft to the country’s badly polluted air, water and soil.

“Yes, you gave us economic freedom, but you are jumping in and looting us, robbing us of our future, corrupting the culture, our values and the environment,” he said before the anniversary from Taiwan, where he works at an investment firm.

“All this has been clearly and widely expressed by Chinese people in the last two decades. This discontent will emerge into one thing one day: a revolution. I am sure the Communist Party is very well aware of this.”

Sign of the times

On both sides of Hong Kong’s iconic harbour, scuffles broke out between rival political factions in the worst confrontations so far at a June 4 event, highlighting rising tensions between the city and mainland China.

It comes at a sensitive time for the Asian financial centre, with debate over constitutional reform looming and pro-democracy activists planning to hold mass protests in July to demand the right to choose their own candidates for a poll in 2017 to elect the next Hong Kong leader.

Pro-Beijing group the Voice of Loving Hong Kong taunted vigil-goers at the entrance to Victoria Park, where more than 30 uniformed police monitored proceedings.

“Let the past pass ... it’s already 25 years. If we continue, all Chinese are losers,” said chairman of the group Patrick Ko.

The group played a video in which it claimed 5,000 soldiers were injured during the Tiananmen clashes, more than the 4,000 citizens it said had been hurt.

Hung Lap, wearing a yellow headband, charged at the group with a large banner that said: “Overthrow the Communist Party, the Chinese Communist Party is an evil cult.”

Amid pushing and shoving, Hung shouted into a loud-hailer: “Go die... Get out of Hong Kong.”

Hong Kong residents have increasingly taken to the streets to protest against perceived meddling by China in the city’s affairs, causing a headache for mainland authorities.

The world’s first museum commemorating the victims of the Tiananmen crackdown opened in Hong Kong in late April and more than 6,000 people have visited since then.

International criticism

The White House said the United States continued to honour the memories of those who gave their lives on June 4, 1989, and called for a full account of what happened.

In democratic Taiwan, which China claims as its own, President Ma Ying-jeou said China should ensure that a “tragedy” like June 4 never happened again.

“If Chinese authorities can tolerate differences, not only can that raise the height and the legitimacy of those in power, but also send a clear message to Taiwan that political reform in China is serious,” Ma said in a statement.

Japan, engaged in a bitter territorial dispute with China, used the anniversary to urge Beijing to respect human rights and the rule of law.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei expressed anger at comments from the United States and the United Nations, saying they interfered in China’s internal affairs.

PARIS — World leaders meet in Normandy on Friday for the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings, but with Europe in its worst security crisis since the Cold War, the event will be a backdrop to urgent diplomacy over Ukraine.

Some 18 national leaders will attend ceremonies along with 3,000 veterans along France’s northern coast where Allied forces landed on June 6, 1944 in a sea-borne invasion that sped up the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, US President Barack Obama and — thanks to a last-minute invitation from France — Ukraine’s president-elect Petro Poroshenko will be among the leaders gathering for a closed-door lunch on Friday.

“Yes, this is a day about the veterans and remembering those that died for basic freedoms, but it’s also an opportunity to look ahead and de-escalate the Ukraine crisis,” said one French diplomat, who declined to be identified.

Putin is due to meet France’s President Francois Hollande, Germany’s Angela Merkel and Britain’s David Cameron on the sidelines of the events — his first encounter with Western leaders since Moscow’s annexation of the Crimea in March.

No separate meeting between Putin and Obama is planned as yet but French organisers say the luxurious 18th century Chateau de Benouville, where lunch will be prepared by four Michelin star chefs, will have rooms ready for bilateral sessions.

Speaking to French radio station Europe 1 on Wednesday, Putin offered to meet Obama in France.

“There is no reason to think President Obama does not want to talk to the Russian president,” he said. “It’s his choice. I am ready for dialogue.”

Hollande is due to meet with Obama at a restaurant in central Paris and then host Putin at the presidential palace for a late supper on Thursday, the eve of D-Day.

“I’m meeting President Obama and President Putin. It’s late in the day, but the objective is that it is useful. What’s at stake is Ukraine, it’s stability and it’s security,” Hollande told reporters in Poland on Wednesday, adding he would also try to enable dialogue between Putin and Ukraine’s Poroshenko.

G-7 sideline meetings

Having been excluded from the Group of Eight major powers for its seizure of Crimea and its part in the destabilisation of eastern Ukraine, Russia was not included in the Group of Seven summit in Brussels this week.

Relations between Russia and the Ukraine as well as with Europe and the United States are in tatters after protesters pushed a Moscow-friendly Ukrainian president from power in February, and Russia then annexed Crimea.

Russia has deployed tens of thousands of troops near the Ukrainian border and warned it could send them in to protect Russian-speakers in the east, while Poroshenko and Ukraine’s pro-Western government have ignored Moscow’s demands for an end to Kiev’s military operation against pro-Russian separatists.

One Russian diplomat said D-Day could be an opportunity to replicate a constructive meeting between Putin and Obama at the Saint Petersburg G-20 meeting last year, where the two men came to an agreement over destroying Syria’s chemical arsenal.

Aside from the diplomatic activity, Putin, whose country lost more than 20 million people during World War II, will join leaders including Britain’s Queen Elizabeth and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski for a display marking D-Day on Sword Beach.

Obama will give a speech in the morning at the US cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach where about 2,500 US troops died.

With the youngest survivors of the landings now in their late 80s, the events carry extra significance.

MADRID — Spain set its future King Felipe VI on the path to the throne Tuesday, launching an unprecedented handover of the crown in the face of anti-royalist protests.

One day after 76-year-old King Juan Carlos declared an end to a four-decade reign that guided Spain from dictatorship to democracy, the government met to ponder the first succession in post-Franco history.

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy presided over an extraordinary Cabinet meeting to draw up a draft abdication law, which must then be approved by parliament in a process that could take weeks.

The twilight of the Bourbon king’s reign has been dogged by scandal and health woes including repeated hip surgery.

Dressed in a green military uniform at a prescheduled medal-awarding ceremony in the sun-splashed grounds of the El Escorial palace near Madrid on Tuesday, the king could be seen walking with an awkward shuffle.

During the televised ceremony the monarch nevertheless looked relaxed as he spoke occasionally to his son, 46-year-old Crown Prince Felipe, as the pair appeared together for the first time since the abdication was announced.

Not all Spaniards celebrated the impending arrival of Felipe, a tall former Olympic yachtsman more popular than his father, and his 41-year-old wife, the future queen Letizia, a glamorous former television news presenter.

Thousands of anti-royalists took to the streets across Spain in the hours after Juan Carlos’ announcement, calling for a vote on the monarchy’s survival.

Protesters filled Madrid’s central Puerta del Sol square and police closed access to the royal palace just a few minutes’ walk from the demonstration for several hours.

“Tomorrow, Spain will be a republic!” chanted crowds of demonstrators, brandishing placards reading: “No more kings, a referendum,” “A royal transition... without a king,” and “Bourbons up for election”.

“I think now would be a good time to proclaim a republic,” said Paola Torija, a 24-year-old therapist for the disabled. “He had his moment of glory but today it is a bit archaic, a bit useless, an extra cost especially in the crisis we are living in.”

Three small leftist parties — Podemos, United Left and the Equo green Party which together won 20 per cent of the vote in May 25 European Parliament elections — called for a referendum on the monarchy.

Spain’s prime minister defended the monarchy and said a referendum would require a change to the constitution.

“I think the monarchy has the support of the great majority in Spain,” Rajoy said at a conference Tuesday in Madrid.

“Propose a constitutional reform if you don’t like this constitution. You have the perfect right to do so. But what you cannot do in a democracy is bypass the law,” he said.

Spain’s 1978 constitution, which established a parliamentary democracy and a largely ceremonial monarchy, was supported by a great majority of Spaniards in a referendum at the time, the prime minister said.

Juan Carlos was widely respected for smoothing Spain’s transition to democracy after the death of General Francisco Franco in 1975, most famously facing down an attempted military coup in February 1981.

But many Spaniards were outraged when they discovered the king took a luxury elephant-hunting trip to Botswana in 2012 as they struggled to find jobs in a recession.

Resentment grew when the king’s younger daughter Cristina was named a suspect in relation to her husband Inaki Urdangarin’s allegedly corrupt business practices.

In a televised address to the nation on Monday, Juan Carlos said the economic crisis had awakened a “desire for renewal”.

MADRID — Spain’s King Juan Carlos said on Monday he would abdicate in favour of his son Prince Felipe, aiming to revive the scandal-hit monarchy at a time of economic hardship and growing discontent with the wider political elite.

“A new generation is quite rightly demanding to take the lead role,” Juan Carlos, 76, said on television, hours after a surprise announcement from Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy that the monarch would step down after almost 40 years on the throne.

The once popular Carlos, who helped smooth Spain’s transition to democracy in the 1970s after the Francisco Franco dictatorship, seemed increasingly out of touch in recent years.

He took a secret luxury elephant-hunting trip to Botswana in 2012, a time when one in four Spanish workers was jobless and the government teetered on the brink of default.

A corruption scandal in the family and his visible infirmity after repeated surgery in recent years have also eroded public support. Polls show greater support for the low-key Felipe, 46, who has not been tarnished by the corruption allegations.

The king’s younger daughter, Princess Cristina, and her husband, Inaki Urdangarin, are under investigation and a judge is expected to decide soon whether to put Urdangarin on trial on charges of embezzling 6 million euros in public funds through his charity. He and Cristina deny wrongdoing.

The king, who walks with a cane after multiple hip operations and struggled to speak clearly during an important speech earlier this year, is stepping down for personal reasons, Rajoy said.

But a source at the royal palace told Reuters the abdication was for political reasons. The source said the king decided in January to step down, but delayed the announcement until after the European Union election on May 25.

Political analysts said the ruling conservative People’s Party (PP) was eager to put the more popular Felipe on the throne to try to combat increasingly anti-monarchist sentiment, after small leftist and anti-establishment parties did surprisingly well in the election.

The country is just pulling out of a long recession that dented faith in politicians, the royal family and other institutions. The PP and the Socialists, which have dominated politics since the return to democracy, are committed to the monarchy, but they polled less than 50 per cent between them in the recent election.

Smaller leftist parties Podemos, United Left and Equo Green Party, which together took 20 per cent in the European vote, all called on Monday for a referendum on the monarchy.

“People are calling for political regeneration, a change in the institutional functioning of the state after around 40 years of democracy, and they’ve started with the royals,” said Jordi Rodriguez Virgili, professor of political communication at Navarra University.

Spain does not have a precise law regulating abdication and succession. Rajoy’s Cabinet was scheduled to have an extraordinary meeting on Tuesday to set out the steps for Prince Felipe to take over as Felipe VI. The transition will likely be accomplished by passing a law through parliament, where the PP has an absolute majority.

“We’ve been hearing continuously over the last few months on the necessity for deep change. The feeling is that the European elections have been a turning point and I believe the decision has been made in this context,” said Rafael Rubio, constitutional expert at Madrid’s Complutense University.

A prince for new times

There has been media speculation over an abdication since last year.

Sixty-two per cent of Spaniards were in favour of the king stepping down, according to a January poll by Sigma Dos. That compared with 45 per cent a year earlier. Only 41 per cent of those polled had a good or very good opinion of the king.

Felipe has a positive rating of 66 per cent and most Spaniards believe the monarchy could recover its prestige if he took the throne, according to the poll.

“Felipe has a lot more energy to do the job,” said Alfonso Romero, 36, a student.

Political analysts speculated Felipe may try to seek dialogue between Rajoy and Catalan President Artur Mas, who is leading a movement to break away from Spain. But Mas said on Monday that Felipe’s taking the throne would not dissuade him from trying to hold a referendum on independence in November.

The prince, who has had a growing role in ceremonial events in the past year, is seen as more practical and in tune with current affairs than Carlos, a jovial skier and sailor once beloved for his common touch and seen as much more accessible than the older generations of British royals.

Carlos will be the second European monarch to abdicate in just over a year. Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands stepped down in April 2013 to make way for her son Willem-Alexander.

Felipe married divorced journalist Leticia Ortiz in 2004 and they have two daughters. The royal family began a Twitter feed (@CasaReal) on their 10th wedding anniversary, May 21, with tweets on both Carlos and Felipe’s weekend visit to El Salvador for the swearing in of President Salvador Sanchez Ceren.

The prince was in Spain on Monday but had no official events planned until Tuesday when he is scheduled to appear with the king at the El Escorial monastery and former royal palace.

As king, Felipe will be Spain’s head of state, representing the country at summits, official visits and in meetings with business leaders.

Even if he can win Spaniards over, he will continue to face a sense that the country does not need a king.

“I’m not a monarchist and don’t have a high opinion of them,” said Maria Luisa Villaseca, a retired public employee visiting the medieval city of Toledo. “I think they should call a referendum and ask citizens what they want.”

DONETSK, Ukraine/MOSCOW — Russia gave Ukraine a breathing space on Monday in a multi-billion-dollar gas dispute but balanced the concession with fierce denunciations of Kiev and NATO, while fighting raged all day in eastern Ukraine.

Russia accused NATO of whipping up dangerous tensions near its borders and encouraging Ukraine to use force against pro-Russian separatists. At a tense meeting in Brussels, the alliance urged Moscow to stop arming the rebels.

In the eastern city of Luhansk, Ukrainian border guards said a pro-Russian militia had attacked one of their posts with automatic weapons and grenade launchers in the early hours, triggering a prolonged battle about which both sides gave conflicting information.

Ukraine and its Western allies accuse Moscow of fuelling the pro-Russian uprising that threatens to break up the former Soviet republic of 45 million people. Russia denies orchestrating the unrest, and says Ukraine’s attempts to end it by military force are making the situation worse.

In a conciliatory signal, Russia’s Gazprom gave Ukraine until June 9 to resolve the two countries’ long-running row over gas pricing, postponing a threat to cut off supplies as early as Tuesday.

But two top Russian officials turned up the volume of Cold War-style rhetoric in the worst East-West crisis since the fall of Communism a quarter of a century ago.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow would submit a draft resolution to the United Nations Security Council later on Monday, calling for an immediate end to the violence in eastern Ukraine and the creation of humanitarian corridors to help civilians escape the fighting.

In pointed comments aimed at newly elected Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, Lavrov said that Western nations had assured Russia the situation in Ukraine would improve after the May 25 election that brought him to power. Instead of that, he said, “everything is happening in exactly the opposite way”.

“People are dying every day. Peaceful civilians are suffering more and more — the army, military aviation and heavy weapons continue to be used against them,” Lavrov told reporters in Moscow.

‘Unprecedented activity’

In Brussels, Russia’s envoy to NATO accused the Western alliance of exacerbating the crisis.

“We have noticed unprecedented NATO activity near Russia’s borders. It is excessive, inappropriate and weakens stability, security and predictability in the Euro-Atlantic region,” state-run RIA news agency quoted Alexander Grushko as saying.

A NATO spokeswoman said alliance members called on Russia “to stop the flow of arms and weapons across the border, to stop supporting armed separatists in Ukraine, and to withdraw in a full and verifiable manner their troops from the Ukrainian border”.

Russia denies arming the rebels or orchestrating the unrest, although increasing numbers of Russian fighters have been seen on the separatist side.

President-elect Poroshenko and Ukraine’s pro-Western government have defied Moscow’s repeated calls for an end to what Kiev calls its “anti-terrorist” operation against armed separatists in the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions, who want to follow the example of Crimea by splitting from Ukraine and joining Russia.

New deadline

Poroshenko is due to be inaugurated on Saturday and will immediately face an array of crises, including the new deadline in the gas dispute.

Since the overthrow of pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich in February, Russia has demanded a sharp increase in the price Ukraine pays for gas. Kiev says it cannot afford it and wants the discounted price it negotiated in the past.

While the dispute has dragged on, Gazprom has continued billing Kiev at the higher rate. It says Ukraine already owes it more than $5 billion in unpaid bills and is running up more debt at a rate of more than $1 billion per month.

But after Kiev paid off $786 million of its gas debt, Gazprom announced a six-day extension of the deadline until June 9. Gazprom also said that it would not sue Ukraine’s gas supplier Naftogaz over unpaid bills during the coming week.

The dispute has wider energy implications for Europe, which gets a third of its gas needs from Russia and almost half of these supplies via Ukraine.

Rising violence

Despite a pullback of some of the tens of thousands of Russian troops on the border with Ukraine, violence increased in the east of the country at the start of last week, with dozens of pro-Moscow rebel fighters killed in a government assault. Many were Russians, whose bodies were sent back across the border.

In Monday’s fighting, Ukrainian security sources said a force of separatists had occupied the upper floors of an apartment block and were shooting into the border post on the southern edge of Luhansk, a city very close to the frontier with Russia.

A separatist fighter, Alexander Gureyev, said by telephone that a Ukrainian fighter plane had shot at the regional administration building. “There are dead and injured in the city,” he said.

Interfax-Ukraine news agency quoted a senior local health official as saying that an explosion in the building had killed two people. Ukrainian authorities denied they had conducted an air strike.

Earlier, a border guard spokesman, Oleh Slobodin, said: “We have eight or nine wounded. The attackers have five dead and eight wounded.”

In Geneva, a spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs declined to comment on Russia’s proposal to create humanitarian corridors for civilians to get out of harm’s way.

“Generally, when we talk about corridors, it always needs to be clear, first of all from where to where? And particularly, who is going to secure that corridor?” spokesman Jens Laerke said.

“Because once you say here’s a corridor, once people start moving on that, if there’s no one to protect them, then it’s very dangerous.”

MADRID  –– Spain's King Juan Carlos plans to abdicate and pave the way for his son, Crown Prince Felipe, to take over, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy told the country Monday in an announcement broadcast nationwide.

He did not say when Juan Carlos would abdicate because the government must now craft a law creating a legal mechanism for the abdication and for 46-year-old Felipe's assumption of power.

The 76-year-old Juan Carlos oversaw his country's transition from dictatorship to democracy but has had repeated health problems in recent years.

His popularity also dipped following royal scandals, including an elephant-shooting trip he took in the middle of Spain's financial crisis during which he broke his right hip and had to be flown from Botswana back to Spain for medical treatment aboard a private jet.

The king came to power in 1975, two days after the death of longtime dictator Francisco Franco. He endeared himself to many Spaniards in large part by putting down an attempted military coup in 1981 when he was a young and largely untested head of state.

As Spain's new democracy matured over the years, the king played a largely figurehead role, traveling the globe as an ambassador for the country, and was a stabilising force in a country with restive, independence-minded regions such as the Basque region and Catalonia.

KABUL — US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel on Sunday said a prisoner swap that freed soldier Bowe Bergdahl could create an “opening” for direct talks with the Taliban as the leader of the insurgents hailed the exchange as a “big victory”.

Bergdahl, the only US soldier captured by the Taliban since the war began in 2001, was freed in exchange for five senior insurgent detainees as both parties claimed success for the dramatic deal, brokered by Qatar.

But the swap was criticised by several Republican lawmakers who demanded to know whether the Taliban prisoners would return to fighting the United States.

In an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press”, Hagel staunchly defended the trade as an effort to save Bergdahl’s life and said it could provide a breakthrough for peace in Afghanistan.

“So maybe this will be a new opening that can produce an agreement,” he said, noting that the United States had engaged in talks with the Taliban in the past.

Mullah Mohammad Omar, the spiritual leader of the Taliban, also issued a rare statement praising the “big victory” for the Afghan Muslim nation in a sign seen by a government negotiator and some analysts as potential confidence building measure.

Earlier Sunday, Hagel paid a brief unannounced visit to Bagram Air Base north of Kabul, where he met privately with more than a dozen of the team that carried out the exchange mission, according to The Washington Post.

“We believed that the information that we had, the intelligence that we had, was such that Sgt. Bergdahl’s safety and health were both in jeopardy, and in particular, his health was deteriorating,” he told US media.

“It was our judgment that if we could find an opening and move very quickly... that we could get him out of there, essentially to save his life,” he added.

Bergdahl’s release came four days after President Barack Obama announced a timetable for a final US pullout by end-2016.

The five Guantanamo prisoners were named as Mohammad Fazl, Norullah Noori, Mohammed Nabi, Khairullah Khairkhwa and Abdul Haq Wasiq, all influential former officials of the Taliban regime toppled by the US-led invasion of Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks.

They were swapped for Idaho native Bergdahl, who disappeared from a base in Afghanistan’s eastern Paktika province.

A senior US administration official confirmed that the United States had transferred the five Afghan Guantanamo detainees to Qatar, as did a Taliban statement which added the men were with their families.

A separate source said the Taliban detainees would spend the year in Qatar.

‘This will help peace’ 

“I think it shows all sides’ goodwill for trust-building and start of the peace talks in near future,” Ismail Qasimyar, of Afghanistan’s high peace council, said of the deal.

Borhan Osman, a researcher and analyst said the deal, while not directly connected to the peace process, could increase both sides’ confidence in each other.

“It does bolster the Taliban’s political office’s status as sort of reliable address for the movement,” he said, referring to the group’s “embassy” in Qatar.

“The trade of prisoners in a smooth manner would naturally serve as a ‘nice’ measure, that could be followed by more measures towards peace talks if they want to,” he added.

The men’s release had long been the main condition imposed by the Taliban to launch peace negotiations with the United States.

President Barack Obama appeared with Bergdahl’s parents at the White House to announce his release.

“Today the American people are pleased that we will be able to welcome home Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, held captive for nearly five years,” he said.

Qatar-brokered deal 

Obama also expressed his “deepest appreciation” to the Emir of Qatar for his help in securing the return.

Bergdahl was in good condition after the Taliban handed him over to “a few dozen” US special forces backed up by helicopters at an undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan, defence officials said.

According to officials quoted in US media he appeared to have difficulty speaking English after five-years with Pashto speaking Afghans.

Pentagon officials said he was brought to Bagram for medical treatment, and was then flown to the US military medical facility at Landstuhl in Germany for further treatment and evaluation.

He will later be flown back home to be reunited with his family.

Since his capture, Bergdahl has appeared in several Taliban videos.

In January the United States obtained a “proof of life” video of the soldier — the first concrete evidence in more than three years that he was still alive.

In his statement, Obama said “Sergeant Bergdahl’s recovery is a reminder of America’s unwavering commitment to leave no man or woman in uniform behind on the battlefield”.

Several of his Republican opponents took a harsher view of the deal.

Influential Senator John McCain demanded to know what steps were being taken to “ensure that these vicious and violent Taliban extremists never return to fight against the United States and our partners”.

McCain described the men being released as “hardened terrorists who have the blood of Americans and countless Afghans on their hands”.

KIEV — Ukraine’s new pro-Western leader enters a defining week Sunday seeking to head off a Russian gas cut and secure US President Barack Obama’s backing with his country threatened by civil war.

Confectionery tycoon Petro Poroshenko will also attempt to arrange the first meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin since the February ouster of a pro-Kremlin regime in Kiev sparked the worst East-West crisis since the Cold War.

And it ends Saturday with the 48-year-old sworn in as the fifth president of Ukraine after a convincing first-round May 25 election win handed him a mandate to resolve a separatist insurgency threatening the very survival of the ex-Soviet state.

“These meetings will be crucial,” said Kiev-based political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko.

“They will help establish direct relations and introduce Petro Poroshenko to world leaders — first and foremost, Barack Obama.”

Russian gas threat

Ukraine’s third “gas war” with Russia in less than a decade erupted when Moscow — stunned by the sudden ouster of an ally who had just rejected an EU alliance that the Kremlin greatly feared — nearly doubled the price it charges its neighbour for the fuel.

Kiev accused Moscow of “economic aggression” and refused to cover a bill that Russia puts at $5.17 billion (3.79 billion euros).

Russian gas transits through Ukraine supply about 15 per cent of European needs and a top EU envoy is now urgently seeking a compromise that could save 18 member states from seeing supply cuts go into effect Wednesday.

A final round of talks has been set for Monday in Brussels after Ukraine’s Naftogaz state energy firm — bowing to both EU and Kremlin pressure — transferred a $786 million payment to its Russian counterpart Gazprom to keep the talks alive.

Gazprom now says it is willing to discuss a lower price and analysts believe that a compromise is in sight.

“Our view is that Gazprom and Naftogaz will eventually reach a compromise,” Moscow’s VTB Capital investment bank said in a research note.

“However, it is unclear how long the discussions between the parties will continue and what the possible consequences will be.”

Obama handshake 

Poroshenko will shake hands with Obama on Wednesday in Warsaw wary of an address last week in which the White House chief put American diplomacy above military might in confronting threats such as that of Russia’s expansion.

“Just because we have the best hammer does not mean that every problem is a nail,” Obama told US Military Academy graduates.

That message was greeted with awkward silence by former Soviet satellites in eastern Europe that have been clamouring for firmer US protection since Russia’s seizure of Ukraine’s strategic Black Sea peninsula of Crimea in March.

Washington is sending Assistant Secretary of Defence Derek Chollet for meetings in Kiev on Monday aimed at reassuring Poroshenko and showing Putin the strength of the US commitment to Ukraine.

“I am certain that as soon as president-elect Poroshenko is sworn into office, we will begin discussions about our future cooperation on security and defence,” US Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt told Kiev’s Dzerkalo Tyzhnia newspaper.

Poroshenko for his part promised to seek a “new security alliance with the United States and Europe” that could protect Ukraine without its outright membership in the Cold War-era NATO bloc that Russia views with hostility and mistrust.

Elusive Putin meeting 

Putin spelt out the threat of an outright invasion of Ukraine when he sought and won parliament’s authorisation on March 1 to use any means necessary to “protect” ethnic Russian living across the border.

But the threat of war began receding last month when Putin surprised many by suddenly softening his tone.

The Kremlin chief advised Ukraine’s eastern Lugansk and Donetsk regions against holding May 11 independence referendums that went ahead anyway but which he then refused to recognise as binding.

Putin also promised to “respect” the outcome of Ukraine’s own election and began pulling back the 40,000 troops he had massed at Ukraine’s doorstep in an ominous show of strength that touched off near-panic in Kiev.

Western diplomats remain sceptical about the sincerity of Putin’s shift. But they agree that it provides a welcome opening for Poroshenko.

The Ukrainian political veteran now hopes to tap the ties he nurtured in Moscow while serving as foreign minister under now-deposed president Viktor Yanukovych to set up a meeting with Putin on the sidelines of Friday’s D-Day commemorations in Normandy.

Resolving Ukraine’s two-month separatist insurgency “is impossible without engaging the Russian leadership”, Poroshenko said a day after his election.

But the Kremlin is yet to confirm the meeting and analysts expect no breakthrough even if such talks are held.

“This would be something like a political reconnaissance mission for Poroshenko,” said analyst Fesenko.

“It is important to understand Putin’s mood and to know what kind of concessions he might make.”