Seven Ukraine troops killed in separatist east

Ukraine said Tuesday that seven of its soldiers had been killed and 14 wounded in the bloodiest clashes in the pro-Russian separatist east in two months.

The announcement follows a flurry of recent talks between world leaders and Moscow aimed at stopping the 26-month war.

“In the past 24 hours, as a result of military operations, seven Ukranian servicemen died and 14 were injured,” military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told reporters.

The death toll was the highest since Ukraine reported seven of its soldiers dying on May 24.

The former Soviet republic has been riven by fighting that has claimed nearly 9,500 lives and shattered Moscow’s relations with the West.

Kiev and its allies accuse Russia of plotting and arming the revolt in retaliation for Ukraine’s ouster of its Moscow-backed president in a February 2014 pro-EU revolution that infuriated Putin.

The Kremlin annexed Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula after flooding it with troops and organising an independence referendum that only a handful of Moscow’s allies accept as legitimate or fair.

Russian President Vladimir Putin denies backing the rebels while admitting that some off-duty or vacationing soldiers may have “followed the call of their heart” and joined the insurgents’ cause.

But few of Kiev’s allies believe his claims.

The resulting chill in relations has complicated the West’s work with Russia in trying to bring an end to the Syrian war — a conflict that has seen Russia continue to back the ruling regime and bombard areas controlled by Western-backed rebel groups.