Berkut assaults Maidan (video, online)
The riot police demand that the opposition stopped the mass riots. Yanukovich has invited opposition leaders to negotiations.
23.15 Berkut is near the House of Trade Unions – the Revolution Headquarters. The building is on fire in several spots. Clashes continue.
22.45 Leader of the Verkhova Rada faction Batkivshchina Arseni Yatsenyuk has urged President Victor Yanukovich to stop the bloodshed in Kiev and conclude a truce till morning. He announced it in Maidan Nezalezhnosti on the evening of February 18.
22.40 Kiev airports are closed. The third policeman has died, the Ministry of Internal Affairs said. Protesters have also informed about a new victim.
22.15 About 20 thousand people are still in Maidan. They have already set three armoured troop carriers and one water-cannon on fire. Berkut keeps destroying barricades.
22.00 Maidan assault started an hour ago. You can constantly hear shots and blasts. Maidan is on fire.
21.40 The police are asking women and children to leave Maidan. They are going to conduct “A Counter-Terrorism Operation” there. Meanwhile, bloodshed is inadmissible, pro-government oligarch Rinat Ahmetov claimed. President Yanukovich is not responding to Western leaders’ phone calls, namely German chancellor Angela Merkel’s, Ukrainian mass media report. Mobilization has been ordered in some Ukrainian regions.
21.20 Berkut members have broken the barricades. Protesters have set an armoured troop carrier in Khreshchatyk on fire.
21.00 The police have started assaulting barricades near Maidan. Water-canons are being used against protesters. Shots and blasts can be heard.
20.50 The Ukrainian government has forbidden the access of transport to Kiev after 12 a.m.
20.30 Nine people have died in the today’s clashes in Kiev, Interfax reports referring to Kiev police. Two policemen were killed – one of them died of gunshot wounds in hospital and the other one died in the ambulance.
20.20 The broadcasting of Channel 5 has been stopped in Ukraine. You can only watch it of you have a satellite. The other channels are working as usual. Channel 5 is known for a neutral coverage of the events of the past few months and its sympathy for protesters. According to some sources, it is controlled by opposition oligarch Pyotr Parashenko.
20.00 Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovich has invited opposition leaders to meet him at 11 p.m. today, ex-Minister of Internal Affairs Yuri Lutsensko told tizhden.ua. He could not say whether the opposition leaders were preparing any plan of actions for the next few hours.
19.25 Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovich will meet opposition leaders on Wednesday, February 19, Komentary reports referring to Verkhovna Rada speaker Vladimir Rybak. The negotiations will start at 11 a.m. EET, he said.
19.19 About 20 thousand people have gathered in Maidan. Protesters are dismantling the pavement tiles and putting them into piles in order to slow down Berkut’s possible attack.
Berkut has started assaulting the Ukrainian House, some sources say. Shots have been heard there, Ukrainian mass media report.
18.40 There are bodies on the barricades.
Driving inspectors have restricted the access of transport to Kiev. It is difficult to enter the city from Odessa, Zhytomir, Borispol and Brovar highways now.
18.00 The riot police are destroying barricades.
17.30 Berkut are heading for Maidan along Institutskaya Street. Head of the Ukrainian Security Service Alexander Yakimenko and Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Vitali Zaharchenko have urged opposition leaders to calm protesters and go back to the negotiating table. If the riots do not stop by 6 p.m., the riot police will introduce proper order ‘by all legal means’.
17.20 The metro has stopped working in Kiev. Berkut are approaching Maidan from Grushevski Street.
Activists say that seven protesters are in a terminal state now, censor.net.ua reports.
There are a hundred wounded people in the House of Officers now, activists say.
Moscow blogger Iliya Varlamaov has photographed the burning door of Kiev City Administration.
The Verkhova Rada was supposed to meet in Kiev on February 18. However, a few thousand oppositionists approached the building in the morning. Radicals assaulted the building which resulted in clashes with the riot police: tear gas and flash-bang grenades were used. MPs were blocked inside the building. The protesters did not demand anything – they only urged President Victor Yanukovich to appoint an early presidential election.
Photo: zyalt.livejournal.com
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