A protester lobs tear gas at riot police during a mass rally in Kiev on December 1. What started out as a protest against President Viktor Yanukovych’s backtracking on integration with the European Union has turned into a massive call for the government to step down.
Genya Savilov/AFP/Getty
Protesters pry stones up from Kiev’s streets to use as weapons against riot police. The rallies in Ukraine’s capital turned violent on Sunday when a group of demonstrators rushed the presidential palace, only to be met by police wielding tear gas, grenades, and truncheons.
Protests continued into Monday night as the opposition occupied government offices and flooded Kiev’s Independence Square, the heart of the Orange Revolution in 2004, which ousted then-Prime Minister Yanukovych from office after accusations of electoral fraud.
Vasily Maximov/AFP/Getty
Protesters faced off against police at the presidential office in Kiev while parliamentary leaders met in an undisclosed location to discuss Ukraine’s future. Rifts have emerged in Yanukovych”s government and among the oligarchs who have backed his rule.
Efrem Lukatsky/AP
Protesters warm themselves with makeshift fires and stoves in Independence Square in Kiev in the early hours of Monday morning. By midday, the Ukrainian government effectively ceded control of the square to the protesters.
Sergei Grits/AP
Protesters poured into the streets over the weekend after Yanukovych refused to sign a trade accord with the European Union last week, allegeldy under pressure from Moscow. On Friday, the president attempted to backtrack and said he was still considering the E.U. accord, but his modification seems to have come too late to stem a massive outpouring of anger among ordinary Ukrainians.
The protests over the weekend have destabilized Ukraine’s already shaky economy, forcing the central bank to intervene and prop up the hryvnia. Meanwhile, Yanukovych plans to travel to China on Tuesday, to seek loans and investment to avert a looming debt crisis.
Dozens of protesters were injured during clashes with riot police over the weekend. Activists stormed the street, chanting “Revolution!” and “Down With the Gang,” a reference to Yanukovych’s government.
Russia has been blamed for pressuring Yanukovych into blocking the E.U. deal, and analysts say the backlash on the streets is partly a reaction against Kremlin meddling in Kiev. Russian President Vladimir Putin, in turn, blamed the unrest on outside actors trying to foment a coup. But some Western diplomats speculate that Yanukovych was simply betting that the E.U. would capitulate and offer Ukraine a better deal, and that the president’s gambit backfired.
Aleksandr Yalovoy/Kommersant Photo, via Getty
