Moscow fumes after European Union cuts off some shipments: Reuters

Russia summoned the European Union’s ambassador in Moscow on Tuesday, fuming over what it calls an illegal rail blockade of a Russian outpost on the Baltic Sea, the latest stand-off over sanctions imposed over the war in Ukraine.

On the ground in eastern Ukraine, Russia’s separatist proxies said they were advancing towards Kyiv’s main battlefield bastion. A Ukrainian official described a lull in fighting there as the “calm before the storm”.

The latest diplomatic crisis is over the Kaliningrad enclave, a port and surrounding countryside on the Baltic Sea that is home to nearly a million Russians, connected to the rest of Russia by a rail link through EU- and Nato-member Lithuania.

Lithuania has shut the route for basic goods, including construction materials, metals and coal, which it says it is required to do under EU sanctions that took effect on Saturday. Russia calls the move an illegal blockade and has threatened unspecified retaliation against Lithuania.

The standoff creates a new source of confrontation on the Baltic, a region already set for a security overhaul that would hem in Russia’s sea power as Sweden and Finland apply to join Nato and put nearly the whole coast under alliance control.

Moscow had summoned a Lithuanian diplomat on Monday, but the EU has deflected responsibility from the Lithuanians, saying the policy was a result of collective action by the bloc.