Editor's Note: The Kyiv Post is providing continuous coverage of the protests in Kyiv and other cities following the government's decision on Nov. 21 to stop European Union integration by rejecting an association agreement. The rallies started on Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square). The events can be followed on Twitter using hashtags #euromaidan and #євромайдан or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/EuroMaydan.
Watch video of EuroMaidan events here on live stream and hromadske.tv
Open Access movie screening is scheduled for the Trade Unions House
Dec. 12, 9:30 p.m. Activists will have a chance to watch Open Access documentaries at 7 p.m. in Trade Unions House on Dec. 13. The project made by New Citizen civic movement features five movies – including ones about Mezhyhirya, an Afghan war veteran, schools in Poltava Oblast and others. The screening is free. The discussions with producers will be held after the screening. — Olena Goncharova
Police summons 1+1 channel journalists
Dec. 12, 8:01 p.m. Police demands 1+1 TV channel to list the information about the journalists and cameramen who covered the events on Dec. 1 on Maidan Nezalezhnosti and near president’s administration. The police also wants video materials the journalists made on Dec. 1. They asked journalists to help the police investigation as eyewitnesses, 1+1 website reports. — Olena Goncharova
Kyiv’s Maidan is calm, festive
Dec. 12, 7:45 p.m. Around 5,000 –7 ,000 people can be seen now on Independence square. Czech music bands are performing on the main stage in support of the EuroMaidan rally. The concert is organized by the Czech embassy in Ukraine. Most of the protesters are located between the stage and the independence tower and around them. Parliamentarians and activists continue speaking on the stage. — Interfax-Ukraine
Protesters get new place to stay
Dec. 12, 6 p.m., EuroMaidan activists set up another headquarters in the House of Architects on Hrinchenka Street, according to Andriy Parubiy, Batkivshchyna party member and one of the EuroMaidan commandants. Parubyi said they have official permission to stay in the building. He also adds that there’s no more space for tents on the Independence square, Ukrainska Pravda reports. — Olena Goncharova
Plans being hatched to hold large-scale pro-government rally this weekend
Dec. 12, 4:45 p.m. The Kyiv Post visited the ongoing pro-presidential rally in Maryinsky park. Several thousands of people were there, waving flags of the ruling Party of Regions. The party’s deputies addressed participants of the rally from a soundstage, and music and dancing ensembles are performed for the crowd.
“We came here from Vinnytsia to support our party. I’m concerned about the political situation in the country. I think this situation can be solved only with a roundtable, when all sides of the conflict including opposition, authorities, other parties and members of civic society will get together to discuss and solve the problem,” said Artem Stasiuk, 24, a businessmen and member of the Party of Regions.
“I’m here every day,” said Valentyna Kotyk, 66, a pensioner from Kyiv and long-standing member of Party of Regions. A massive pro-presidential rally is planned for Saturday and Sunday in Kyiv, many people are expected to come, according to her. Former Party of Regions lawmaker and organizer of the pro-government rally in Mariinskiy Park Oleg Kalashnikov will lead the rally, she says.
But Kalashnikov told the Kyiv Post that the big rally on the weekend is yet to be decided. “This is true that today many regional representatives who are coming to us proposed to hold a big rally. But this issue is now only being negotiated,” he said. “The decision will be made on a higher level.”
Meanwhile, one of the attendants told the Kyiv Post off the record that all participants of the pro-presidential rally are paid Hr 300 and more per day. “Why would I go to work then?,” she said. — Anastasia Forina, Oksana Grytsenko, Kostyantyn Chernichkin
Dec. 12, 4:05 p.m. Although the snow that fortifies EuroMaidan’s barricades started to melt, the community inside them continues to live its own life as anti-government protests enter their fourth week. People sign from stage, food is being cooked and taken around by volunteers, people come and go and discuss the plans for the day and the latest news in political life. The barricades themselves have become a local attraction, and their guards – local celebrities, eagerly posing for pictures and chatting to many local and foreign visitors who come and go inside.
Popov gets a new message
Dec. 12, 3:45 p.m. If the taking over the city hall by the protesters was not enough, the protesters sent a new message they really don’t like presidential appointee city administrator Oleksandr Popov. They laid two funeral wreaths in front of the building, bearing his name as if we was dead.
The city of Kyiv has not had an elected mayor since July 2012, when the previous mayor resigned. The powers of city council ran out in July. But there has been no election date set as the authorities are afraid that they have little chance to win this election. — Katya Gorchinskaya
Helsinki Commission Chairman Ben Cardin calls on Ukraine’s officials to respect human rights
Dec. 12, 1:25 p.m. Helsinki Commission Chairman Sen. Ben Cardin (MD), a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, issued the following statement calling on Ukrainian authorities to respect the protesters.
“I am deeply dismayed by yesterday’s decision by Ukrainian authorities to use Interior Ministry troops against peaceful protests in central Kyiv, coming after the already brutal dispersal of protestors last week. There is no justification for these actions, which, along with other human rights violations, are grossly at odds with Ukraine’s Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) commitments and a serious blot on Ukraine’s OSCE Chairmanship. I call upon the Ukrainian authorities to take immediate, resolute steps to ensure that freedom of assembly and expression are respected.
“These recent events come against the backdrop of the overall deterioration of human rights and democracy in Ukraine in the last few years. The U.S., Canada and the EU have spoken out forcefully on these assaults on basic freedoms. Unless the Ukrainian authorities take concrete actions to improve the situation, the international community should seriously consider undertaking additional measures such as the imposition of targeted sanctions against Ukrainian officials responsible for human rights abuses, including the suppression of peaceful protests.
“I continue to stand with the people of Ukraine in their aspirations for a more democratic future, in which the rule of law and respect for human rights prevail,” Cardin said.
Road police don’t stop the buses in Kyiv oblast
Dec. 12, 1:10 p.m. The road police don’t stop the buses that are heading to Kyiv, Interior Ministry statement reads. “Kyiv region road police don’t prevent the buses to reach Kyiv,” Yuriy Spaskyi, deputy road police chief of Kyiv oblast said. — Olena Goncharova
MP Andriy Shevchenko receives prosecutor’s summons
Dec. 12, 12:31 p.m. On his Twitter account today, opposition lawmaker and activist Andriy Shevchenko wrote that he received a summons from the Prosecutor’s office. He has been asked to appear there as an eyewitness in a case against police for abuse of office during the early morning events on Nov. 30, when riot police dispersed protesters on Maidan Nezalezhnosti. — Olena Goncharova
Activists picket Kyiv’s Court of Appeals
Dec. 12, 12 p.m. A group of protesters has gathered near the Court Of Appeals in Kyiv. They are picketing the building, as today the court hears the case of two activists who were detained during clashes with riot police in the early morning hours on Dec. 11, Ukrainska Pravda reports. — Olena Goncharova
US defense secretary warns Ukrainian minister of defense against using force on protesters
In a phone call on Dec. 12, U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel warned Ukrainian Minister of Defense Pavlo Lebedyev not to use armed forces of Ukraine against the country’s civilian population “in any fashion.”
According to a readout posted to the State Department’s website, Hagel “underlined the potential damage of any involvement by the military in breaking up the demonstrations and called for restraint.”
Minister Lebedyev stated that it is Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s position not to use the nation’s armed forces against protestors and said he would pass the Hagel’s message directly to Yanukovych, according to the State Department statement.
The U.S. State Department on Dec. 11 said it is considering all options, including sanctions, toward Ukraine, after special Berkut riot police stormed EuroMaidan demonstrators overnight, tearing down barricades that had been erected around Independence Square, the headquarters of the protest movement.
“All policy options, including sanctions, are on the table, in our view, but obviously that still is being evaluated,” Jen Psaki, a State Department spokeswoman, told reporters. She did not specify what types of sanctions the State Department might consider.
“We’re considering policy options. There obviously hasn’t been a decision made. Sanctions are included. But I am not going to outline more specifics,” Psaki added. — Christopher J. Miller
Maidan Open University to hold lectures on central square
Dec. 12, 11:01 a.m. Some 10 lectures are scheduled for today at Open University on Maidan Nezalezhnosti. Everybody’s free to join the lecture, which holds hourly. — Olena Goncharova
Around 70,000 activists from Western Ukraine to join Maidan
Dec. 12, 10:28 a.m. People from Lviv, Ternopil and Ivano-Frankivsk regions are going to join Kyiv’s pro-EU protesters on Maidan Nezalezhnosti. Totally around 70,000 protesters from three western Ukraine regions arrive to Kyiv today, media reports.
Protest at General Prosecutor’s office this morning
Dec. 12, 10:00 a.m. Several thousand people are protesting in front of the general prosecutor’s office this morning, demanding the release of those who were arrested after clashes with police and the dismissal of those responsible for beatings of people and dispersal of peaceful demonstrations that are entering its fourth week. — Katya Gorchinskaya
Protesters spent the night building barricades
Dec. 12, 9:05 a.m. The protesters spent the night rebuilding the old barricades and building a new one at the junction of Prorizna and Khreschatyk in the center of Kyiv.
They’re using any available materials, including snow, which they collect in other parts of the makeshift camp and then deliver to the perimeter.
In addition, they built a new barricade across the road from the city hall blocking the entrance to Luteranska Street, with only a narrow passage left for people.
Protesters also finished the barricade by TsUM, the central department store, at the intersection of Khmelnytsky Street and Khreshchatyk. To fortify the barricade, they poured water all over it from bottles, which froze overnight. —Interfax-Ukraine
Interior Ministry says 5,000 are on Maidan this morning
Dec. 12, 9:00 a.m. The Interior Ministry released a statement saying 5,000 stayed on Maidan overnight, which remained peaceful. Below is the statement.
“On the night of Dec. 11 no violations of public order were recorded. The situation in Kyiv and the country remains calm.
The largest concentration of people is on Maidan Nezalezhnosti – they express the will of almost 5,000 people.
More than two hundred people, according to the police, are in Mariyinsky Park by the Verkhovna Rada.
The Interior Ministry is once again calling on the protesters to be alert and not to succumb to provocations.
Interior Minister Vitaly Zaharchenko appealed to the Ukrainians and reassured them that the police would not disperse EuroMaidan.
Nobody will infringe on citizens’ right to peaceful protest. However, the minister warned that nobody is entitled to violating other people’s rights and legitimate interests. Normal functioning of the capital should not be disrupted.” —Katya Gorchinskaya
Read the coverage of the Dec. 11 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 10 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 9 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 8 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 7 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 6 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 5 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 4 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 3 events here.
Read the coverage of the Dec. 2 events here.
Read the morning coverage of the Dec. 1 events here, and the afternoon and evening coverage here.
