U.S. President Barack Obama on Tuesday nominated veteran diplomat David Hale as ambassador to Pakistan.

Hale, currently ambassador to Lebanon, has previously served as the top U.S. diplomat in Jordan and was special envoy for Middle East peace under Obama.

A New York court sentenced the son of the president of Suriname to more than 16 years in prison Tuesday for attempting to support Hizbullah, considered a terrorist organization by the United States.

Dino Bouterse, who worked in a Suriname counterterrorist unit, had previously also pleaded guilty to conspiring to import five kilos (11 pounds) of cocaine into the United States and admitted a firearms offense.

Former U.S. secretary of state and probable presidential challenger Hillary Clinton condemned Tuesday a bid by Republican senators to disrupt nuclear talks with Iran.

"Either these senators were trying to be helpful to the Iranians or harmful to the commander-in-chief in the midst of high stakes, international diplomacy," Clinton said.

The top U.S. diplomat for Europe declared Tuesday that Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine were subject to a "reign of terror", blaming Russia for a conflict that has claimed thousands of lives.

"Even as Ukraine is building a peaceful, democratic, independent nation across 93 percent of its territory, Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine are suffering a reign of terror," Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The international coalition fighting Islamic State extremists could be jeopardized if the Baghdad government fails to bridge Iraq's sectarian divide, the U.S. military's top officer warned Monday.

Iraq's political leaders have yet to deliver on promises to reach out to the Sunni population and have raised concerns in the region by forging closer ties to Shiite-led Iran, General Martin Dempsey said after spending several hours in Baghdad.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will travel to Lausanne, Switzerland on March 15 to meet with his Iranian counterpart as part of continuing talks on Tehran's nuclear program, the State Department said Monday.

Kerry will sit down with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif for the ongoing "P5+1" nuclear talks, the State Department said, as negotiators race to beat a March 31 deadline for reaching a deal.

The White House on Monday denounced efforts by Republican lawmakers to "throw sand in the gears" of sensitive talks over Iran's nuclear program as "partisan."

Forty-seven Republicans, including Senate leaders and several potential 2016 presidential candidates, wrote an open letter to Iran's leader, warning any deal with President Barack Obama might not be honored in future.

Venezuela recalled its envoy to Washington for consultations Monday, after U.S. President Barack Obama ordered new sanctions against senior Venezuelan officials.

"We call Maximilien Arvelaiz, charge d'affaires in the United States, for immediate consultations," Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez wrote on Twitter.

Experts from the U.N. nuclear watchdog held talks in Tehran Monday in their investigation into decade-old allegations of possible military dimensions to Iran's nuclear program, the ISNA news agency reported.

"Additional information was exchanged. We have decided to carry on with our cooperation," said Iran's ambassador to the International Atomic Energy, Reza Najafi, as state television announced the end of the talks.

A Tibetan woman burned herself to death days before the anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule, a rights group and media said, in the first such incident this year.

The woman in her 40s, whose name was given only as Norchuk, set herself alight Friday near Trotsuk township in Aba county in the southwestern province of Sichuan, the British-based Free Tibet campaign group and U.S.-funded Radio Free Asia (RFA) both said.