Pro-Russian protesters in eastern Ukraine yielded arms in one city and declared a separatist republic in another, as protests broke out in several eastern cities today.

Officials in Kiev told Reuters that the overnight seizure of public buildings in three eastern Ukrainian cities was a repeat of events in Crimea that resulted in the annexation of Crimea.

The Ukrainian Prime Minister, Arseny Yatseniuk, alleged that the protests where orchestrated by Russia, stating,

A leading member of South Sudan’s ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) called for the international community to place further sanctions on individuals responsible for rights abuses and delaying a solution to the country’s conflict.

Rebecca Nyandeng, welcoming recent US sanctions placed on political actors, speaking to Voice of America, said,

The United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, noting that foreign peace=keeping troops were ‘overwhelmed’ warned of a potential genocide in the region.

Urging the international community to send more support to prevent an impending disaster, Ban Ki-moon, said,

A Bahraini court, convicting seven Shiite Muslim protestors of injuring a policemen, sentenced them to 15 years in prison today.

The announcement comes after several anti-regime protestors were injured by Bahrain police on Friday.

The United States president, Barack Obama, signed an executive order today, authorising sanctions against any actors escalating conflict in South Sudan.

The order sets out a list of 12 offences that would warrant sanctions on all property and interests in property that are within or controlled by the United States.

Announcing the order, the White House spokesperson, Jay Carney, said,

The Rwandan President, Paul Kagame, in an interview to mark the 20th anniversary of the mass killings in Rwanda, accused France of participating in the 1994 genocide.

In an interview with the African daily, Jeune Afrique, Kagama denounced the ‘direct role of Belgium and France in the political preparation for the genocide.”

The president went on to accuse French soldiers who were present in military humanitarian missions as being accomplices and actors in the bloodbath.

France started drafting, on Friday, a United Nations Security Council resolution that would refer Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC), for prosecution of war crimes.

Although Syria is not a party to the treaty that created the court, the UN Security council has the power to authorise the International Criminal Court to prosecute.

A photographer for the Associated Press was shot dead today in an attack on the news agency’s envoy on the eve of elections in Afghanistan.

The attack injured a Canadian reporter, Kathy Gannon, and German photographer, Anja Niedringhaus.

The pair were attacked, whilst travelling in their own vehicle with a convoy of election workers distributing ballot boxes across the Khost province.

The European Union will look to establish an international tribunal that solely focuses on crimes allegedly committed by Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian rebels during their war with Serbia, reports the Associated Press.

The court, which will be set up and paid for by the EU, will consider allegations of atrocities and disappearances committed by the victorious Kosovan military at the end of the war.
Outlining the need for a credible process, an EU official said,