Finnish Prime Minister Alexander Stubb warned Tuesday that the conflict in the Ukraine was bringing the world to the "brink of a Cold War" but that trade sanctions were the only credible weapon against Russia.

"Russia's foreign policy doctrine has Cold War elements," he told public broadcaster YLE.

Finland has accused four people of financing Somalia's Al-Qaida-linked Shebab rebels, the authorities said on Wednesday, the first time the Nordic country has brought terrorism funding charges.

The state prosecutor claims the four sent "several thousand euros" to the terrorist group which has been staging a bloody eight-year insurgency in the war-ravaged east African country.

Russia on Wednesday denied a claim by Finland that it held secret talks with the United States in June on ways to resolve the Ukraine conflict.

Finland's parliament on Monday gave the green light to Alexander Stubb to become prime minister after his predecessor said he would step down to pursue a role in European politics.

The 46-year-old was elected by the ruling conservative party on June 14 to form a new government after his predecessor Jyrki Katainen was put forward for a job in the European Commission.

Chemical weapons such as chlorine have been used in a "systematic manner" in Syria, according to an initial report by a team from the world's watchdog investigating alleged attacks there.

The report has not been publicly released, but the United States delegate to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) quoted from it at an OPCW meeting on Tuesday, according to a copy of the statement seen by Agence France Presse.

Alexander Stubb is set to become Finland's new prime minister after winning a vote to head the ruling conservative party on Saturday.

Stubb, 46, currently European and trade minister in Finland, will replace Jyrki Katainen, who said in April he would step down to seek a job within the European institutions.

The global chemical arms watchdog said Friday it has chosen two U.S. and Finnish companies to help destroy Syria's chemical arsenal as part of an ambitious plan that has suffered a string of setbacks.

The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said Finland's Ekokem would destroy chemical weapon ingredients as well as some effluent left over from destruction activities aboard a U.S. ship.

Russian patient Valentina Micheeva (left) talks to her doctor Irina Ivanova four days after her hip operation at the Coxa hospital in Tampere, Finland. Coxa HealthCareFinland, together with other …more

Sitting on a hospital bed with a slight smile on her face, Valentina Micheeva looks a decade younger than her 80 years as she explains how four days earlier she had her hip replaced -- not in her native Russia but at a clinic in Finland.

Two Finnish hostages who spent more than four months in captivity in Yemen returned home on Friday, little more than a day after being released.

Atte and Leila Kaleva, a married couple, arrived at Helsinki airport on a special plane chartered by the Finnish government, evading journalists waiting for them.

Denmark and Finland plan to upgrade the status of their respective Palestinian representative offices in Copenhagen and Helsinki to that of an embassy, the Danish foreign ministry said Saturday.

"It is with satisfaction that we announce our joint intention to work with the Palestinians to be able to upgrade the status of the Palestinian missions in Copenhagen and Helsinki," the foreign ministers of Finland and Denmark, Villy Soevndal and Erkki Tuomioja, said in a joint statement.