Moscow urged to recognise new Kiev leader
Ukraine yesterday accused Russia of unleashing a mass propaganda campaign to persuade global powers not to recognise an election that gave the presidency to a pro-Western tycoon.
The United States for its part acknowledged a "fundamental disagreement" with Russia and said President Barack Obama would extend his support to Petro Poroshenko when he meets the winner of the May 25 presidential election in Warsaw on Wednesday.
The months-long fight for future of the ex-Soviet nation -- splintered between a more nationalist west and a heavily Russified southeast -- has killed more than 300 people and resurrected the geopolitical barriers of the Cold War.
Ukraine's separatist insurgency only intensified after Poroshenko won 54.7 percent of a ballot that was disrupted across swathes of the eastern rust belt.
Ukraine's acting foreign minister said Russia was now using every means at its disposal to unsettle the new Kiev leaders and regain control over its historic domain.
Russia on Friday accused Ukraine of breaching the 1949 Geneva Conventions protecting civilians in wartime by killing and wounding peaceful citizens during its seven-week "anti-terrorist operation" in the separatist industrial regions of Lugansk and Donetsk.
Russian President Vladimir Putin -- keen on seeing Ukraine join a post-Soviet economic union that includes only Belarus and Kazakhstan -- promised to "respect" the will of Ukrainian voters, but has not congratulated Poroshenko on his win.
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