The UN Security Council convened a second emergency session on Ukraine crisis after Russia approved the deployment of its troops in Crimea.Pro-Russian sentiments in Eastern Ukraine have been inflamed by the recent developments.Al Jazeera's diplomatic editor, Reports from the United Nations.

The US has unveiled plans to cut the army's overall troop numbers as it withdraws from Afghanistan in an austerity drive long predicted by defence officials. Chuck Hagel, US defence secretary, said on Monday that the Pentagon planned to reduce the size of the US army to between 440,000 and 450,000 soldiers after about 2015, a cut of by about 50,000 on current levels and the smallest number of troops since 1940 at the start of the second world war. Reports from Washington.