Ukraine takes hard line on protests, 3 killed

A pro-European protester gestures, with riot police officers seen in the background, during a rally in Kiev January 22, 2014. [Photo/Agencies]

WEEKS OF PROTESTS

The protesters have been out on the streets since November, angered by President Viktor Yanukovich's decision to shun a trade pact with the EU and instead accept financial aid from Russia to prop up Ukraine's ailing economy.

But events took a violent turn on Sunday after a mass rally called by the opposition to protest against sweeping new laws that ban any sort of anti-government protest.

In continued overnight violence into Wednesday, two people died from gunshot wounds, according to a statement by the general prosecutor, and a third was said to have been killed in a fall from atop the Dynamo football stadium.

Fifty people were detained overnight and 29 of them were officially charged with taking part in mass unrest, police said. A total of 167 police have been injured. There was no immediate figure for civilians injured.

Azarov said earlier on Wednesday that police deployed on the streets did not possess firearms and the interior ministry has denied that police have used guns during the crisis.

Wednesday's violence erupted ironically as Ukraine marked 'National Unification Day' - the day in 1919 which brought together that part of the country that had been under Russian rule with that which had been in the Austro-Hungarian empire.

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