Civilian wounded after fighting in eastern Ukraine

A civilian was wounded and several houses were damaged in further heavy fighting in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday. The Ukrainian government and Russian-backed separatists blamed each other for the flare-up. Announcing the death of one of its soldiers, Ukraine's military also accused Russian-backed forces of using heavy shelling to try to breach Ukrainian lines. But the separatists accused Ukrainian government forces of attacking first, saying a small group of soldiers had tried and failed to break through their lines.

The Kremlin said it had seen reports of the clashes and was looking into them, adding it did not know what had triggered the violence. Ukraine, Western countries and NATO accuse Russia of sending troops and heavy weapons to prop up separatist fighters in Donbass but that Moscow has denied that accusation.