Portugal beat Ghana 2-1 but fall out of World Cup

BRASILIA: Cristiano Ronaldo scored the winner for Portugal as they beat Ghana 2-1 in Brasilia in Group G on Thursday but both sides still crashed out of the World Cup.

Ronaldo missed three chances with only goalkeeper Fatawu Dauda to beat that would have been enough to put his side into the last 16.An own goal from John Boye gave Portugal the lead before Asamoah Gyan equalised for the Black Stars.

Ronaldo scored the second half winner but he will be ruing the misses which left Portugal stuck behind second place United States on goal difference.

Germany won the group after beating he United States 1-0. (AFP)

No other choice but to stand with the army: Imran Khan

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chief Imran Khan Monday said his party was left with no other choice but to stand with the army after the decision of going ahead with the comprehensive offensive has already been taken.

He said he learnt about the launch of operation in North Waziristan on TV and questioned ‘shouldn’t they have taken us into confidence first?’ “Now what other choice do we have except for standing with the army?”

Imran Khan asked is it a good practice in democracy that the Inter-Service Public Relations (ISPR) comes forward to announce that an operation has been launched?

He said the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, which is the biggest victim of terrorism, was not taken on board. The KP government, therefore, has not made any arrangements for the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), he added.

“If there was no other choice but to go ahead with an operation, then at least we should been taken into confidence,” he lamented.

He said the Prime Minister did not ensure to put the dialogue process under a leadership it had deserved.

Imran Khan said the Prime Minister kept undertaking tours for attracting investment but the terrorism was a much bigger issue. “Investment would automatically flow to Pakistan if it rids itself of terrorism,” he added.

Obama: US will help but Iraq must mend divisions

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama said Friday that he is examining options short of sending ground troops to help Iraq counter a extremist offensive, but warned the country must heal its own divisions.

"We will not be sending US troops back into combat in Iraq, but I have asked my national security team to prepare a range of other options that could help support Iraqi security forces," Obama said.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki´s government has asked the United States to provide military assistance to counter a stunning advance by ISIL, an extremist movement.

But, in brief remarks to reporters at the White House, Obama warned the Baghdad government that it had brought disaster on itself by failing to heal the divides between Sunni and Shiite camps in the country.

"The United States will not involve itself in military action in the absence of a political plan by the Iraqis that gives us some assurance that they´re prepared to work together," he said.

"We won´t allow ourselves to be dragged back into a situation in which while we´re there we´re keeping a lid on things and, after enormous sacrifices by us, as soon as we´re not there, suddenly people end up acting in ways that are not conducive to the long-term stability of the country.

"The United States withdrew the last of its occupation forces from Iraq in 2011, eight years after they overthrew the then dictator Saddam Hussein, but Obama said he was studying options to increase ongoing support for the Iraqi military.

He added, however, that "any action that we may take to provide assistance to Iraqi security forces has to be joined by a serious and sincere effort by Iraq´s leaders to set aside sectarian differences.

"Nobody has an interest in seeing terrorists gain a foothold inside of Iraq and nobody is going to benefit from seeing Iraq descend into chaos," he said.
"So the United States will do our part, but understand that ultimately it´s up to the Iraqis as a sovereign nation to solve their problems."

Obama: US will help but Iraq must mend divisions

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama said Friday that he is examining options short of sending ground troops to help Iraq counter a extremist offensive, but warned the country must heal its own divisions.

"We will not be sending US troops back into combat in Iraq, but I have asked my national security team to prepare a range of other options that could help support Iraqi security forces," Obama said.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki´s government has asked the United States to provide military assistance to counter a stunning advance by ISIL, an extremist movement.

But, in brief remarks to reporters at the White House, Obama warned the Baghdad government that it had brought disaster on itself by failing to heal the divides between Sunni and Shiite camps in the country.

"The United States will not involve itself in military action in the absence of a political plan by the Iraqis that gives us some assurance that they´re prepared to work together," he said.

"We won´t allow ourselves to be dragged back into a situation in which while we´re there we´re keeping a lid on things and, after enormous sacrifices by us, as soon as we´re not there, suddenly people end up acting in ways that are not conducive to the long-term stability of the country.

"The United States withdrew the last of its occupation forces from Iraq in 2011, eight years after they overthrew the then dictator Saddam Hussein, but Obama said he was studying options to increase ongoing support for the Iraqi military.

He added, however, that "any action that we may take to provide assistance to Iraqi security forces has to be joined by a serious and sincere effort by Iraq´s leaders to set aside sectarian differences.

"Nobody has an interest in seeing terrorists gain a foothold inside of Iraq and nobody is going to benefit from seeing Iraq descend into chaos," he said.
"So the United States will do our part, but understand that ultimately it´s up to the Iraqis as a sovereign nation to solve their problems."

Economic growth has increased but most targets couldn’t be met

 

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Finance Senator Ishaq Dar has conceded that the government has missed major economic targets of GDP growth, revenue, investment and inflation in the outgoing year.
The GDP growth remained at 4.14 percent against a target of 4.4 percent but in the last six years, this is the first time that Pakistan registered over 4 percent growth against the revised target of 3.7 percent, taking the per capita income up to $1,386 in 2013-14 from the revised target of $1,369 in 2012-13. Tax collection remained at 16 percent and inflation increased by 8.5 percent and unemployment registered an increase of 6.2 percent.

Announcing the results of the Economic Survey at a news conference, the finance minister said in the first year of its rule, the government spent its time in fire fighting and in the second financial year, which is 2014-15, the masses will be witnessing dividends of the prudent economic policies.

The minister said that he himself fixed the aggressive economic targets for 2013-14 so that the government could not remain complacent and because of hard work and good economic governance, the government had performed well in terms of achieving the GDP growth of 4.14 percent.

He vowed to increase the GDP growth by 1 percent every year and said that the size of the GDP had swelled close to $300 billion. The minister said the unemployment rate had increased to 6.2 percent from 5.9 percent from 2009-10. He stated that the impact of the war against terrorism remained at $102 billion and 50 percent of the population was living below the poverty line of $2 a day income.

“The vulnerable segments of the society will be taken care of and it was I who first proposed the Benazir Income Support Programme as target subsidy to provide solace to the poorest of the poor. The last government in five years time increased the BISP allocation from Rs34 billion to just Rs40 billion,” he said.

However, the government has increased the allocation under the Benazir Income Support Programme to Rs75 billion in the current financial year, which will be increased further in the next budgetary year. Next year, the government will provide financial help to 4,700,000 poor people.

Coming to the GDP growth analysis, the minister said that the overall industrial growth remained at 5.84 percent in the first nine months against 1.37 percent in the same period of the last year. He said the Large Scale Manufacturing (LSM) sector grew by 5.31 percent as against 4.1 percent last year.

The construction sector grew tremendously by 11.3 percent in the first nine months of the current financial year as against the negative growth of 1.7 percent in 2012-13.

Electricity generation and gas distribution sector grew by 3.72 percent against the negative growth of 16.3 percent in the last financial year. “This has really helped increase growth of the industrial sector.” He said growth in small and household sector stayed at 8.4 percent against the growth of 8.3 percent in the same sector last year.

However, the Economic Survey said during 2013-14, energy consumption was 40,185 million TOEs compared to 40,026 million TOEs in 2012-13 showing a growth of 0.4 percent. Now the industrial growth could be questioned with an increase in electricity consumption by 0.4 percent.

However, the minister admitted the agriculture sector growth remained very low at just 2.1 percent against 2.88 percent last year. However, in the next budgetary year, the government will come up with alluring incentives to increase the growth in agriculture sector.

Dar said the growth in important crops remained at 3.7 percent as against 1.2 percent last year. Other crops that included oil seeds and pulses showed negative growth at 3.5 percent as against 6.1 percent last year. He said that the country also witnessed a reduction in growth as cotton production remained at 12.77 million bales against 13.03 million bales.

The minister said that for agriculture sector, the government allocated Rs380 billion for the current year against Rs315 billion last year. Next time the government will increase the credit lines for the agriculture sector. He also mentioned that fertilisers also remained short and the government had somehow managed to provide the imported fertilisers at Rs1,786 per bag plus Rs25 of dealers margin. “We brought down the prices of fertiliser from Rs1,952 per bag to Rs1,786,” he said.

Mentioning the services sector, the minister said that this sector failed to perform up to the expectations as it grew by 4.3 percent against the growth of 4.9 percent in the last financial year.

In transport, storage and communication sector, the growth remained at 3 percent against 2.9 percent, in wholesale and retail trade 5.2 percent against 3.4 percent, finance and insurance 5.2 percent against 9 percent, housing services remained at 4 percent against 4 percent last year and growth in general government services tumbled by 2.2 percent against 11.3 percent and in other private sector, the growth stayed at 5.8 percent as against 5.2 percent.

About inflation, the minister said that during the July-April period, it remained at 8.8 percent against 7.75 percent last fiscal. However, till May this year, inflation remained at 8.6 percent as against 7.5 percent. About the core inflation which he termed very important saying it remained at 8.2 percent against 9.7 percent in 11 months of the outgoing fiscal.

The minister also said that government borrowing had reduced and the monetary policy had improved. Highlighting the exports of the country, he said that exports had increased by 4.24 percent to $21 billion in the last 10 months against $20.1 billion in thesame period last year and because of the GSP Plus, the textile sector grew by 7 percent and raw cotton export 42 percent. However, it would have been better if the value addition had been added and finished products exported instead of exporting raw cotton. However, the imports, the minister said, had increased by 1.2 percent to $37.1 billion from $36.7 billion in 2012-13. Dar mentioned the reason for the increase in exports saying that plants and machinery had been imported on a large scale, which is in a way a positive sign for growth in economy.

Investment to GDP has reduced to 13.99 percent from 14.57 percent of GDP last year. Fixed investment has also tumbled to 12.39 percent of the GDP against 12.79 percent. Out of this, the private investment remained at 8.94 percent against 9.64 percent of GDP. Dar said that total investment was recorded at Rs3,276 billion in 2012-13, which increased to Rs3,554 billion in 2013-14. The minister said that Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) had reached $2.979 billion that also included the $2 billion Euro Bond. However, in the last year in the same period it stood at $1.277 billion.

Talking about the foreign exchange reserves, the minister said that reserves had reached $13.66 billion against $11.4 billion. He mentioned in February last year, the reserves stood at just $7.5 billion out of which the central bank reserves were at $2.7 billion. Now the situation had completely changed as right now the State Bank of Pakistan reserves had reached $8.8 billion whereas the reserves of commercial banks were stagnant at $4.8 billion.The growth in remittances has slightly reduced to $12.894 billion from $13.921 billion.

US must lead globally but show restraint: Obama

WEST POINT: President Barack Obama says the United States must lead on the world stage, but also show restraint before rushing into military operations overseas.

Obama is outlining his foreign policy vision for his final two years during a commencement address at the US Military Academy.

Obama says the US is emerging from a long period of war. But he says isolationism isn´t an option in the 21st century.

He says the US will use force when necessary, but is stronger when it doesn´t act alone.

Obama also says he plans to work with Congress to increase support for the Syrian opposition.

The speech comes a day after Obama offered a blueprint for ending the US military engagement in Afghanistan. (AP)

Army men used to criticise ISI but faced no treason charges

 

ISLAMABAD: Though many media men and journalists are out to prove that Hamid Mir, Geo and Jang Group are traitors merely because Hamid Mir had alleged before the attack on him that he will be attacked by the ISI chief and some other ISI individuals, there are countless examples where regular army officials, even a sitting ISI chief, made more serious allegations against the prime intelligence agency but were never declared traitors.
Geo and Jang Group have repeatedly issued statements that they have the highest regard for all institutions. Despite the fact that Hamid Mir was hundred percent convinced that he will be attacked, the channel only aired the news after he was attacked informing the people what the assessment of Hamid Mir was without giving a final judgment as to who carried out the attack.

Was Hamid Mir the only one to point out some problems or some rogue elements within the ISI? No. There are many from within the armed forces, even former DG ISI Lt Gen Ahmad Shuja Pasha and many retired officers including former COAS Gen (retd) Pervez Musharraf, who clearly hinted at grave problems within the intelligence outfit. Many experts have termed such revelations as “ISI within ISI” and analysed that apparently these “rogue” elements are stronger and influential.

It is also an important point that politicians, bureaucrats, and everyone is attacked and criticised for anything but few people consider generals as “sacred cow”, over and above any criticism despite the fact that they are involved in violence against innocent citizens. Reports of judicial commissions establish the involvement of ISI elements in such violent activities. The biggest office of the state is the office of the president and even it is never spared from criticism.

It was Ahmad Shuja Pasha who at the time of his appearance before the Abbottabad Commission confessed that “ISI had brutalised many decent people”. However, Pasha had added, “ISI mindset, culture and methodology were changing.” Before this Abbottabad Commission, Pasha slammed former army chief Gen (retd) Pervez Musharraf for bowing down to the Americans.

Pasha had disclosed that Musharraf had caved in to the US so promptly that the Shamsi airbase was given to them for drone strikes in Pakistan. Pasha was made to confess before the Abbottabad Commission that the Abbottabad incident was the result of lack of capacity, inadequate knowledge and wrong attitude. Pasha had even admitted of enforced disappearances, notwithstanding the fact the ISI had no detention powers.

While many in the media are trying to unnecessarily defend the ISI and are not ready to admit that correct criticism will help the institution improve, Pasha’s statement endorses report of the Umar Cheema Commission that the agency remained involved in terrible things like kidnappings and torturing citizens.

When Pasha said so, it was not treason but when Hamid Mir said the same on the basis of credible information, it is treason despite the fact that he is admitted in hospital after sustaining six bullets and is unable to walk.

Gen (retd) Musharraf in his 2011 interview with ABC in USA said, “It is possible that rogue members of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the military knew of Osama bin Laden’s hideout in Abbottabad.

“As a policy, the army and the ISI are fighting terrorism and extremism, al Qaeda and the Taliban. But rogue elements within are a possibility.“As I said, at the lower level, somebody (could be) following a policy of his own and violating the policy from above is a possibility.”

Top army officials have admitted that when Musharraf was attacked twice, some ISI officials were involved. But it was not treason as though it was hundred percent proved and these incidents killed many individuals.

These statements proved the existence of rogue elements within the ISI and pointing out this fact would have helped the ISI improve and cleanse its ranks of such elements.Former minister of state for religious affairs Dr Amir Liaquat Hussain stated on May 5, 2005 that then President Musharraf had faced threats from within. He had elaborated that some elements from within the institutions could attack to kill the former army chief. But it was not treason though the role of ISI “individuals” was clearly pointed out.

If there are rogue elements within the ISI or any other institution, they could be mentioned, criticised and blamed. There are no holy cows which could never be touched even if found involved in illegal activities or highhandedness against innocent civilian citizens. When any official of such a disciplined institute is involved in any such activity, the head of the organisation is always blamed as it is incomprehensible that he is not in the picture. A senior journalist, during a private meeting, tried to inquire from Pasha about the involvement of his agency’s officials in kidnapping and torturing Umar Cheema. Pasha was unable to deny but failed to deliver a direct response.

The Judicial Commission has concluded that the role of agencies in the Umar Cheema case was eminent.Keeping aside Pakistan, any wrongdoings of intelligence agencies are highlighted, questioned and criticised in civilised world by professional journalists. In the USA, the American media exposed CIA’s many wrongdoings, including the worst i.e. desecration of Holy Quran in Guantanamo Bay. Majority of the US people who have respect and dignity get united against the American government and elite intelligence agency CIA and get many wrongs reversed.

However, in Pakistan Hamid Mir’s own friends in the media are letting him down, so discussing his opponents is not important. Even in India, the independent Indian media used to expose scandals against its own army and a shameful scandal was reported about the Indian Army chief in recent years. All this brought improvements in those institutions of India. But all this is treason here in Pakistan and consequently the situation and professional excellence of security institutions is also not hidden from anyone.

Not only top army officials made such allegations against the ISI with all proofs and certainty but even top politicians did so but that was never treason. Pakistan’s present interior minister and the then leader of the opposition Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan made speeches taking the name of DG ISI and alleging him of involvement in illegal and unconstitutional activities. In his interview with Hamid Mir in Capital Talk, Nisar has even said that DG ISI Ahmad Shuja Pasha was making and strengthening a political party – PTI. He never gave any evidence but that was not treason. Today Nisar says he has never seen anyone making allegation this way in the entire world.

Samsung Galaxy S5 is packaged for India, but not really priced for it

 

Samsung Galaxy S5 will cost between Rs 51,000 and Rs 53,000

The Samsung Galaxy S5 is finally here. But you might not be really happy about the fact that the phone costs at least Rs 51,000. It could be as high as Rs 53,000.

The other small catch is the fact that the phone being launched in India is not powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 and hence would not a 4G phone. The version being launched in India is powered by an octo-core processor combo (quad 1.9 GHz + Quad 1.3 GHz) which seems to be similar to the Exynos 5 processors on the latest Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and Note Pro 12.2-inch tablet.

As reported by indianexpress.com earlier, the company also launched the entire new Gear range along with the Galaxy S5. The Gear 2 is priced at Rs 21,900, while the Gear 2 Neo and Gear Fit are more affordable with a Rs 15,900 price tag. It has also opened up these devices to almost the entire Galaxy range, of which there are 35 million users in India. Earlier, the Gear devices synced only with a handful of top-end Galaxy phones. However, they still don’t work beyond Galaxy ecosystem and Vineet Taneja, the country head for India, said this has been done deliberately to draw people towards the Galaxy range.

While the pricing might appear steep for a lot of people, the fact is that high prices have not really deterred people from buying flagship phones. A case in point is the success of iPhone 5s despite its price tag. Plus, Samsung is certain that people who want to buy these phones will do so with the help of EMI schemes.

The rest of the specs of the Samsung Galaxy S5 are similar to what was announced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in the last week of February. The change in processor has been necessitated by the fact that there is still no nationwide 4G service in India. HTC, which earlier this week announced the HTC One M8 which is powered by the same Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor as the S5, has decided to launch only the 4G version in India.

Movie Review: Bewakoofiyaan: Fun But Inspiring

Cast: Rishi Kapoor, Ayushmann Khurrana, Sonam Kapoor

Director: Nupur Asthana

Rating: Three and a Half Stars

Sometimes, love just ain't enough. So there we have two people in love. The pampered but not spoilt bureaucrat's daughter Mayera and her lover beau Mohit whose upward mobility is frozen by an employment meltdown in his airline organization (spicy allusion to the Kingfisher crisis, yes?)

It's Delhi's noveau riche Gurgaon world bathed in cosmetic conceit. Sonam Kapoor and Ayushmann Khurrana blend into this gleaming kingdom's excesses effortlessly. The two of them are so good as a couple, imagining them apart for even a portion of the bitterness that bites into the narrative during the second-half becomes unbearable.

Debutant director Nupur Asthana's film is a bright scrambled world of wealth, luxury and the yuppy club's unstated desperation to move up the corporate ladder. It is also, by its very definition, a ridiculously self-important delusional world.

Miraculously this film with its gleaming polished surfaces neither gasps nor laughs at the ignobility of upward mobility. There is an interestingly crafted fight scene between the film's lead pair where Mayera reminds Mohit that she has not bought a new pair of shoes during the last two months because of his job loss. That she doesn’t realize how ridiculous she sounds to Mohit is a measure of the underlining irony that the narrative scrapes out of these characters while portraying the exacerbated materialism of the go-getting generation.

Habib Faisal's writing is smart and amiable, crowded with quaint colloquialisms culled from the capital youngster's language. The writing also surprises itself by becoming inwardly-drawn and introspective at the most unexpected moments. That the screenplay has got Ayushmann to play the cool guy whose perfectly laid-out plans fall apart, is a stroke of luck for this likeable film.

Ayushmann looks like the guy next-door who wouldn’t mind pulling a few strings to float higher than the level allotted to him by fate. He brings a suave arrogance to his role and creates a cohesive graph for his character. He is an actor to watch.

Of course it helps Ayushmann that he has Rishi Kapoor to play his girlfriend's hawk-like father. Rishi’s character of the IAS officer on the verge of retirement (with a companion from his work place who typically, offers his "humble" advice on every matter) is brilliantly written.

Rishi's Sehgal is a pompous name-thrower with an inflated sense of self-worth, over-possessive about his only daughter's life and preferences. V.K. Sehgal is a striking image of a man on the verge of erupting into a self-deprecatory laughter, if he only he knew how funny his quirks look from the outside.

Rishi brings to the characters a cornocupia of "cool". Seldom in his any other recent film except Do Dooni Chaar has this brilliant actor expressed such pleasure in putting forward his character’s point of view. It’s no coincidence that film too was written by Faisal.

So many of Rishi Kapoor’s scenes with Ayushmann stand tall because of the way the two characters meet as adversaries who fortunately love the same girl in different ways. Sonam as the girl torn between an autocratic dad and unreasonable lover is so in-character you wonder whether the role and its fetish for designer labels were written specially for her.

Bewakoofiyan has nothing new to say. And that is its greatest virtue. It is Meet The Parents where the father and the prospective son-in-law's roles are better played than the original. Yes, Rishi and Ayushmann are better than Robert de Niro and Ben Stiller were in the Hollywood film about the father of the bride.

The narrative sparkles with a mischievous elegance. The winking homage to the go-getting glam-set of Delhi works mainly because the three protagonists are so immersed in the goings-on they make us forget that we've seen most of these conflicts over and over again in the past. In terms of the fluency with which the cliche about the love birds and the girl's disapproving dad is tackled, Bewakoofiyaan is a marked improvement on Yashraj Productions' last two pretentious hammy films Shuddh Desi Romance and Gunday.

Ayushmann's performance is oh not so hammy. A pure delight to behold after Ranveer Singh and Arjun Kapoor's over-energized bravado in Gunday.

Bilawal visits Thar but where is Mr Asif Ali Zardari?

Bilawal visits Tharparker but where is PPP’s top leader and former President Asif Ali Zardari when dozens of innocent children have died because of lack of food and medical care caused by the callous indifference of his party’s government in the province?

Apparently the former president has vanished during these testing times for the people of Thar as not even a single statement has been issued by Asif Ali Zardari, who is said to be in Dubai which is just over an hour long flight from Karachi.

Silence on part of the PPP’s topmost leader on this crisis situation of national importance and global embarrassment is badly felt by all and sundry when already Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has toured the affected areas and the Supreme Court had taken suo moto notice of the situation.

Neither the PPP media cell nor Zardari spokesperson of any of his partymen has even bothered to issue a statement on his behalf. Such press statements on different issues on Asif Ali Zardari’s behalf has been issued even in the recent past but on Thar’s killing of dozens of children not a word of sympathy or condemnation has been issued by the former president.

The last press statement of Zardari was dated March 8. Issued on the eve of international women’s day, former President Zardari had called upon the government to remove the impediments in the way of smooth functioning of the National Commission on the Status of Women to enable it function freely and effectively for the purposes for which it was set up to protect the social, economic, political and legal rights of women.

On March 5 the former president paid rich tributes to young lawyer Fizza Malik who was martyred by the terrorists in an attack in Islamabad court.On these dates March 5 and March 8 the issue of Thar had already come into focus of the media but still it did not catch the eyes of Zardari, who has been often using Sindh card during his party’s rule at the centre.

The reported death of over hundred children in Thar because of non-provision of food by the PPP government in Sindh, has jolted the whole of Pakistan. As soon the media focused on this crisis, which speaks volumes of the incompetence and apathy of the provincial government, the prime minister, the chief justice of Pakistan, the chief justice of Sindh High Court and others immediately took serious notice of this act of human catastrophe.

The media pressure made the otherwise “inactive” and “sleeping” Chief Minister Sindh Qaim Ali Shah to visit the area. Even Bilawal Zardari Bhutto reached Thar on Monday when the prime minister was to tour the area. However, still Asif Ali Zardari remains off the scene. Probably Mr Zardari has adopted the strategy to make his son active.

Although apparently Syed Qaim Ali Shah rules the province, it is generally believed and said that the actual ruler of the province is Asif Ali Zardari.Zardari’s choice men are occupying all the key positions in the province whether those occupied by the politicians or by the serving or retried bureaucrats.

Lavrov snubs Ukrainian but says talks will continue

PARIS: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday resisted Western pressure to meet his Ukrainian counterpart but said talks with the United States and others would continue in coming days.
At the end of a day of intense diplomatic negotiations in Paris, Lavrov left the French foreign ministry without having held a hoped-for meeting with acting Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsya.
The United States, backed by Britain, France and Germany, had urged Lavrov to agree to a face-to-face meeting as a signal of Moscow's willingness to de-escalate the current stand-off with the West over Russia's actions on the Crimean peninsula.
In a short statement, Lavrov said his departure did not mean an end to efforts to resolve the current crisis. "We had a long day of discussions on Ukraine," the veteran Russian diplomat said. "We are all concerned at what it is happening there.
"We agreed to continue those discussions in the days to come to see how best we can help stabilise, normalise the situation and overcome the crisis. "The discussions will continue, and that's it."
Lavrov had earlier held two bilateral meetings with US Secretary of State John Kerry. After the second session, the Russian claimed it had been agreed that Ukraine should uphold a February 21 deal signed between now-ousted president Viktor Yanukovich and the opposition.
US officials denied that this had been agreed, insisting that such a deal could be reached only with the involvement of the Ukraine government that has replaced Yanukovich's administration.