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Protesters today seized a government building in the Ukrainian capital while also maintaining their siege of several governors' offices in the country's west, raising the pressure on the government.
After meeting with President Viktor Yanukovych for several hours late yesterday, opposition leaders told the crowds that he had promised to ensure the release of dozens of protesters detained after clashes with police, and stop further detentions. They urged the protesters to maintain a shaky truce following violent street battles in the capital, but were booed by demonstrators eager to resume clashes with police.
The truce has held, but early today protesters broke into the downtown building of the Ministry of Agricultural Policy, meeting no resistance. "We need to keep people warm in the frost," said one of the protesters, Andriy Moiseenko. "We cannot have people sleeping in tents all the time." The demonstrators allowed ministry workers to take their possessions, but wouldn't allow them to go to work.
The move followed the seizure of local governors' offices in several western regions yesterday.
In Lviv, near the Polish border, some 450 kilometres west of Kiev, hundreds of activists burst into the office of the regional governor, Oleh Salo, a Yanukovych appointee, shouting "Revolution!" They forced a local governor to sign a resignation letter and remained in the building, refusing to let the workers in.
Protesters also have retained control of offices in four other western cities seized yesterday, though they suffered a setback in Cherkasy, about 150 kilometres southeast of Kiev, where police barricaded the governor's building from inside and prevented them from taking control. Police reinforcements arrived later, dispersing the protesters and arresting several dozen of them.
Yanukovych, meanwhile, called an emergency session of parliament which is controlled by his loyalists next week to discuss the tensions. It wasn't clear if Yanukovych's move yesterday reflected his intention to bow to some of the protesters' demands, or was just an attempt to buy some time and try to ease tensions.
His Interior Minister Vitali Zakharchenko issued a statement late yesterday guaranteeing that police would not take action against the large protest camp on Independence Square, known as the Maidan. He also urged police not to react to provocations.
