A senior British minister ruled out sending arms to Ukraine Sunday as the United States and European nations sought ways to pressure Russia over the conflict in the ex-Soviet republic's east.

William Hague, who was foreign secretary until last year and is still a minister seen as close to Prime Minister David Cameron, said governments should think "very, very carefully" about such a move.

Japan urged South Korea again Sunday to return disputed islets, one of the issues which have soured ties between the two U.S. allies.

Seoul controls the islands in the Sea of Japan (East Sea) which it calls Dokdo. They are known in Japan as Takeshima.

Hizbullah has reportedly supervised and funded fighters planning to target U.S. interests in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab of Emirates and Jordan.

Sources told the pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat on Sunday that there is new evidence proving Iran's involvement with al-Qaida and Nusra Front after Tehran embraced a number of fighters scheming to attack U.S. interests in Riyadh, Dubai and Amman.

Pentagon chief Ashton Carter headed to southern Afghanistan on Sunday to review plans to withdraw U.S. forces in a volatile area that has long preoccupied American commanders.

In his first visit abroad days after he took over as U.S. defense secretary, Carter met senior officers and troops at Kandahar airfield, a key base that hosts U.S. special forces and advisers as well as helicopters and other aircraft.

The Pentagon's new chief, Ashton Carter, flew to Kabul on Saturday to confer with commanders and Afghan leaders about the future of the American military presence in Afghanistan.

Only days after taking the helm as defense secretary, Carter paid an unannounced visit to a country where U.S. troops have been deployed for more than 13 years but are now in a scaled back role.

Germany and France demanded Friday that a crumbling Ukraine truce be "fully respected" even as pro-Russian rebels celebrated a battlefield victory in a strategic town and exchanged artillery fire elsewhere with government troops.

"The ceasefire has been violated several times," French President Francois Hollande said in a joint Paris media conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Philippine Muslim rebels said Friday they acted purely in "self-defense" in a clash that killed 44 police commandos in the volatile south last month, despite police claims that they were ambushed.

January's botched anti-terror operation in Maguindanao province saw the single biggest loss of life of government forces in recent memory and has cast doubt over the peace process, sparking calls for the resignation of President Benigno Aquino.

The United States voiced fears Thursday that the Palestinian Authority may be teetering on the brink of collapse because of a lack of funding, as Israel withholds taxes and donor aid stalls.

Washington has been in urgent talks with regional leaders as well as other stakeholders in the frozen Middle East peace process in a bid to try to release more funds.

The United States will continue to push Cuba on its human rights record, American lawmakers said in Havana on Thursday, insisting reopening diplomatic channels was the best way to do so.

A team of nine Democratic Congress members are in the communist island nation for talks aimed at normalizing relations between the former Cold War foes.

Nearly two dozen U.S. House Democrats on Thursday urged the postponement of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's planned speech to Congress, saying the controversially-timed address could "undermine" nuclear negotiations with Iran.

House Speaker John Boehner invited Netanyahu to address a joint meeting of Congress on March 3 two weeks before his country's elections, and the speech, in which the prime minister will discuss the threat of Iran's nuclear program, has caused a political furor in Israel and Washington.