Ukraine's president seeks talks with Putin, Western leaders amid tensions

Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko gestures as he speaks during a joint press conference at the PGE National Stadium, the venue of the NATO summit, in Warsaw, Poland July 9, 2016. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said on Thursday he wanted to speak directly with Russian President Vladimir Putin and several Western leaders amid a spike in tensions between Kiev and Moscow.

Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Kiev on Wednesday of using terrorist tactics to try to destabilise Crimea, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014. Russia said it had thwarted armed Ukrainian attempts to get saboteurs into the peninsula. Kiev has dismissed the allegations.

Poroshenko said he had asked his foreign minister to arrange telephone conversations with Putin, with the leaders of Germany and France, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and European Council President Donald Tusk.

(Reporting by Alexei Kalmykov; editing by Matthias Williams and Gareth Jones)