Ukrainian protesters today blockaded administrative buildings and camped on Kiev's central square in a bid to oust the government after police brutality and a row over an EU pact plunged the nation into its worst political crisis in a decade.
European Union powers condemned the recent violence and called for restraint from Kiev while President Vladimir Putin of Russia, which wants closer ties with ex-Soviet Ukraine, slammed the anti-government protesters.
Incensed by a crackdown on an opposition rally calling for the resignation of President Viktor Yanukovych and his government, more than 100,000 people, led by politicians like world boxing champion Vitali Klitschko, poured into the streets of Kiev and other Ukrainian cities yesterday.
The biggest demonstrations since the pro-democracy 2004 Orange Revolution degenerated into unprecedented clashes with riot police who fired stun grenades and smoke bombs at masked demonstrators, who in turn hurled stones and tried to storm Yanukovych's office.
Speaker Volodymyr Rybak told reporters that the parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, which is controlled by Yanukovych's ruling party, would tomorrow discuss a vote of no-confidence against the government.
Some 15,000 supporters of closer relations between the ex-Soviet state and the European Union today camped out in tents on Independence Square today.
"We will stay here until the victorious end, until the government, the president and the parliament are removed," said Stepan Galabar, a 22-year-old protester from the western town of Kolomyia, munching a sandwich in his tent.
Opposition supporters blockaded the main government building and occupied the mayor's office as officials tried to carry on with their work.
Authorities said 190 had been injured, including police, demonstrators and more than 40 journalists.
Seeking to capitalise on Ukrainians' anger at corruption and economic woes, the opposition hopes to sustain momentum for what it has called a new "revolution."
But during a visit to Armenia, Putin slammed the protests in Ukraine as something "more like a pogrom than a revolution."
In a phone call today, Yanukovych asked President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso to receive his aides to further discuss the pact, the EU said.
