German police said Friday they had arrested a man who hoarded guns, ammunition and bomb-making material in a nuclear-proof family bunker he built fearing an attack by Russia.

The 59-year-old electrician had constructed the emergency shelter by expanding and reinforcing the basement of his family home in Kelheim in the southern state of Bavaria.

The symbols of Ukraine have been hidden somewhere in the school in the country's war-torn east -- but the headmistress will not say exactly where.

One year after the start of protests in Kiev that toppled a pro-Russian government and set in motion a chain of events that set off a bloody pro-Russian rebellion, at school Number 33 in insurgent-held Donetsk, all signs of Ukraine have been assiduously removed.

Ukraine's military on Friday accused Russia of shelling its territory for the first time since the signing of a nominal ceasefire in early September.

"Over the past day, for the first time since the signing of the Minsk agreement, the shooting of Ukrainian territory restarted from the side of the Russian Federation," said Ukrainian military spokesman Andriy Lysenko.

A high-level Syrian delegation will meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow Wednesday to discuss possibly relaunching peace talks to end the country's civil war, a senior Syrian official said Thursday.

"President Putin will receive the delegation headed by Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem, and the meeting will center on the relaunch of negotiations," the official said of the meeting with the key Damascus ally.

Russia on Thursday shrugged off reports that North Korea may be firing up a facility for processing weapons-grade plutonium as Pyongyang threatened a fresh nuclear test.

"Right now a lot of statements are appearing that some preparations are underway for new tests or the resumption or ramping up of activity in the nuclear and rocket spheres," said Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

A special envoy of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un on Thursday praised his landmark meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, expressing hope that the two nations would strengthen ties.

On Tuesday, Putin held talks with envoy Choe Ryong-Hae during the high-ranking North Korean official’s week-long visit to Russia.

A convoy of international monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) was shot at by "uniformed personnel" in east Ukraine, the organization said Thursday.

The OSCE said that a uniformed man on the back of a flat-bed cargo truck fired two shots in the direction of their vehicles as they were driving on Wednesday afternoon near the government-held town of Mariinka, some 15 kilometers (nine miles) west of the rebel stronghold of Donetsk.

When Igor Romanenko's friend suggested heading to a gathering on Kiev's Independence Square a year ago Friday, he had no idea he was about to witness the birth of a movement that would change his country forever.

The sandy-haired film director was angry and disappointed at the announcement that then-president Viktor Yanukovych had turned his back on a landmark deal with the European Union in favour of closer ties with Russia. 

Russia on Wednesday called for Ukraine to stay out of the NATO alliance, insisting that a "non-aligned status" was in the interests of the ex-Soviet country.

"There is no doubt that (Ukraine's) non-aligned status is important not only from the point of view of ensuring stability in the European Atlantic but also from the point of view of fundamental national interests of the Ukrainian people," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters.

Leading critics of President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday urged Britain to step up pressure on the Kremlin chief by imposing sanctions on visiting Russian government officials and oligarchs.

Former prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov, members of the punk rock band Pussy Riot and environmental campaigner Evgenia Chirikova also urged Western leaders to stay united against Russia over Ukraine.