Ukraine's parliament on Thursday held its first sitting since pro-Western parties won a crushing poll victory, with lawmakers facing a mammoth task to drag the war-wracked nation back from the brink of collapse.

Deputies in the new-look Verkhovna Rada chamber sang the national anthem before holding a minute's silence in memory of those killed in Kiev protests and the conflict in east Ukraine. 

Interpol has launched a hunt for a powerful Kremlin insider turned critic who was once known as "Putin's banker" but more recently ran into bankruptcy and left the country.

Russian authorities accuse Sergei Pugachyov of stealing state money issued to support his now-defunct Mezhprombank during the 2008-2009 global financial crisis.

NATO's top military commander jetted into Ukraine for high-level talks on Wednesday as fighting rumbled on between government forces and Kremlin-backed rebels in the east.  

U.S. General Philip Breedlove was set to meet with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko as Kiev stirred further Russian ire by stating it hoped to join the Western security alliance.   

NATO's top military commander said Wednesday he was "very concerned" that Russia's military build-up in the annexed Crimean region could be used as a launchpad for attacks across the whole Black Sea region.

U.S. General Philip Breedlove's comments come amid fears in Kiev that Russian-backed rebels will try to grab more land in eastern Ukraine to establish a land corridor to Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in March.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem has met with March 8 officials at the Syrian embassy in Yarze, al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Wednesday.

The daily said the meeting was held over dinner on Tuesday night.

French President Francois Hollande on Tuesday delayed the controversial delivery of a high-tech warship to Russia "until further notice" over the Ukraine crisis.

"The President of the Republic considers that the current situation in eastern Ukraine still does not allow for the delivery of the first" warship, Hollande's office said in a statement.

Russia cemented control over neighboring Georgia's rebel Abkhazia region Monday with a "strategic partnership" deal that the Georgian government said amounts to annexation.

President Vladimir Putin signed the "alliance and strategic partnership" agreement which formalizes Russian dominance of the tiny separatist region's foreign policy, armed forces and economy, as well as placing Russian guards on the border with the rest of Georgia.

Russian deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov is scheduled to pay a visit to Lebanon in December, announced the National News Agency on Monday.

It said that the Russian official will travel to Lebanon on December 5 where he will hold talks with various officials.

Russia is losing around $40 billion (32 billion euros) per year due to Western sanctions over the Ukraine conflict, its finance minister said Monday although President Vladimir Putin dismissed the economic damage as "not fatal".

"We are losing around $40 billion per year due to geopolitical sanctions," Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said in a speech at an economic forum in Moscow, quoted by RIA Novosti news agency.

U.S. troops will remain in Poland and the Baltic states through 2015 "to deter Russian aggression," the top U.S. commander for Europe said on Sunday.

"There are going to be U.S. army forces here in Lithuania as well as Estonia and Latvia and Poland for as long as it's required to deter Russian aggression," said Lt. General Ben Hodges, commander of U.S. Army Europe.