The European Union targeted Ukrainian separatist leader Aleksandr Borodai and 10 other rebels with travel bans and asset freezes yesterday, avoiding fresh sanctions on Russian business to stop antagonising its main energy supplier.

EU governments widened their blacklist to try to end violence that has rocked Ukraine since late last year, when the rejection of an EU trade deal sparked protests.

The EU said Borodai was "responsible for the separatist 'governmental activities of the so-called 'government of the Donetsk People's Republic'".