HELSINKI, July 20. /ITAR-TASS/. Finnish President Sauli Niinisto said on Saturday that the crash of the Malaysia Airlines plane in Ukraine had further aggravated relations between Western countries and Russia.

“The tone of communication between the West and Russia has changed. We are not talking about the start of a ‘cold war’ but the current situation can at least be described as ‘cold peace’, the Hufvudstadsbladet newspaper quoted the president as saying.

President Niinisto said that the Boeing crash could incur political consequences at all levels. He called for the earliest settlement of the Ukraine crisis and stressed the need for Western leaders to participate in that process.

"Boeing 777 of Malaysia Airlines which was making a flight from Amsterdam, the Netherlands, to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia crashed in the Donetsk region in Eastern Ukraine in the evening of July 17. All the 298 people onboard died.