EU's Mogherini, on Moscow visit, says bloc's Russia sanctions to stay

The European Union's top diplomat said on Monday that the bloc wanted better ties with Russia but could not pretend Moscow did not annex Ukraine's Crimea in 2014 and that EU sanctions would stay in place.

Federica Mogherini, on her first official visit to Moscow in her current role as the EU's foreign policy chief, said there was no point in pretending that there were not still real problems in relations between Russia and the EU.

Mogherini was speaking at a new conference in Moscow after holding talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.