CLASHES BECAME WARFARE AGAINST PEOPLE’S SELF-DEFENSE IN DOWNTOWN KYIV – ongoing updates.

Feb. 20: last night’s truce was broken on Maidan in the center of Kyiv. It is still unclear who fired the first live shots which came from the direction of the Conservatory building behind police lines. Molotov cocktails, grenades were also being thrown by police at the Conservatory. The directions of the shots point to a provocation by government forces as it would be extremely difficult for protesters to take firing positions from that direction.

Since then Berkut snipers have been firing at protesters. Over 30 dead as a result.

Events of this afternoon, continued from EVENTS OF MORNING AND EARLY AFTERNOON, 09:08 to 10:52; 11:00 to 12:00; 12:00 to 13:00.

12:50 – Yatsenyuk Demands to Call Off Snipers

Arseniy Yatseniuk via Batkivschyna [Fatherland] Party Facebook page:
Arseniy Yatseniuk demands to remove snipers from the Hotel Ukraine and to punish those who gave orders to shoot people.

Professional snipers zero in on people from the Hotel Ukraine. The hotel is subordinate to the State Executive office of the Presidential Administration. Therefore, all of the responsibility for this lies with the officials.

“I demand that the President gives an urgent order to arrest the leaders of enforcement authorities, who gave orders to shoot people,” underlined Arseniy Yatseniuk. “I also demand an immediate cease-fire on peaceful protesters!” demanded the head of the Political council of Batkivshchyna Party.

13:00 – Snipers in Horodetskiy Street, Controlling Square in Front of Ivan Franko Theater

Mustafa Navyem:
4 fully equipped snipers are on the wall by the side of the House with Chimaeras [Horodetskiy Street]. They completely control the square in front of Ivan Franko theater.

At 13:00, received reports of 13 protesters killed with aimed shots to head or neck

13:15

Sergiy Tsyhipa
Setting out from the Lukyanovka district to Maidan. While MP Oleh Tsarev is trying to fly to Moscow from the Zhuliany Airport. Spot the difference between a courageous “regional”, who promised to crush Maidan in an hour with the help of Berkut’s batons, and an average citizen, armed with word and photo camera.

13:30 – Transport With Troops from Dnipropetrovsk Oblast Crashes in Road Accident

Censor.net:
Today, early in the morning, a vehicle column transporting members of the air portable brigade N25 was heading to Kyiv from the village Gvardeyske of Dnipropetrovsk oblast. A driver of one of the cars lost control of the vehicle near the village Pischanka, of Novomoskovskyy district. Three paratroopers perished as a result of the crash, eight more were sent to the ICU in very grave condition.
(Censor.net, referring to information by Facebook user Ihor Hurtovyy)

VIDEO – Ukrainians Shot with LIVE AMMUNITION

Ruslana shows an armor-piercing round used to shoot protesters, from the Maidan stage

13:56 – Statement of the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists

Press Center of the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists:
“The insurgent Ukrainian people cannot be stopped, neither by bloody persecutions and shameless killings such as in 1937, nor by intimidations of activists: demonstrative arsons of the offices of opposition parties and government forces pressures on business,” says Oleksandr Melnyk, head of Kryvyy Rih city organization of the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists during the meeting at Maidan in Kryvyy Rih, Dnipropetrivsk oblast.

According to Oleh Melnyk, “Yanukovych wants to return Ukraine to the shameless 90’s, when the waste piles of Donbass were overflowing with corpses! Therefore, we must return Ukraine to the Ukrainian people, at any cost!”

On February 19, almost 500 activists gathered at Maidan in Kryvyy Rih, among them many students, to express their support to Maidan in Kyiv and to condemn the criminal actions of the government and the forces.

The Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists of Kryvyy Rih have been actively participating in protest actions.

13:16 – State of Emergency and Shutdown of Communication May Be Imminent

Speakers announce from the stage that there is reliable information about an attempt to introduce the state of emergency, with all kind of communication shut down.
Ruslana: the state of emergency will start a war.

BREAKING: Kyiv City Head Makeyenko Quits Party of Regions, Promises to Reopen Subway

Kyiv City head Volodymyr Makeyenko has left the Party of Regions. He says he takes personal responsibility for the functioning of Kyiv, and will remain city head unless and until dismissed from that post by the people of Ukraine. He makes a furious address to the President, underlining the utmost importance of human life.

Volodymyr Makeyenko’s appeal to the President of Ukraine:

13:26 – Poltava Oblast Authorities On the Side of Protesters

Kolo, Poltava:
Poltava oblast authorities and police has gone over to the side of protesters. Information about their support of the protesters was just received by the editorial office of Kolo news, Poltava.

13:40 – Radio Codes of Internal Troops Acquired

Oleksander Aronets:
[MP] Sobolev informed that the internal troops have passed over all the codes and call signs of the communications services used to convey information from Yanukovych.

Meanwhile, another moment of silence for the dead…

Khrystia Bevz:
Yakiv Yakovych Zayko – MP of 12th calling, editor-in-chief of the magazine “Holos Hromadianyna” [Voice of Citizen], a friend of my father – has perished at the barricades today. For several months, he has been preparing an issue of his magazine completely devoted to the faked case of “pseudo-terrorists from Vasylkiv”, in which my husband is one of the convicted.
May your memory live forever, Yakov Yakovych.

13:14 – Urgent Appeal by Vitaliy Klitschko

Vitaliy Klitschko addresses Ukraine, demands session of Parliament, resignation of Yanukovych, calls people of Ukraine to stop together to stop the bloodshed.

13:14 Interfax-Ukraine: UDAR Party leader Vitali Klitschko has called on MPs to immediately meet in parliament at 1500 to make a decision to resolve the crisis and demanded that President Viktor Yanukovych call early presidential elections.

“We must do the following – First, Verkhovna Rada deputies should immediately meet in parliament at 15.00 to make a decision on a way out of the crisis,” Klitschko said in an urgent appeal published on the Web site of the UDAR Party.

“Second, it’s necessary to reboot the power. President Yanukovych should call early presidential elections. This is now the only way to stop the violence.

13:19 Interfax-Ukraine: A group of Regions Party MPs is initiating an urgent meeting of the Verkhovna Rada to return to a parliamentary-presidential form of government and have expressed their support for the Ukrainian people.

“We, a group of people’s deputies of Ukraine, are calling for an urgent meeting of the Verkhovna Rada today, on February 20, at 15.00 to return a parliamentary-presidential form of government,” they said in a joint statement.

They also expressed support for the Ukrainian people and the expression of their will.

13:48 Death toll rising with at least 35 people killed, most by gunshots from police. Fatally wounded in heads, necks and chests.

Appeal of the Right Sector

Дмитро Ярош

Appeal of the Right Sector to the Wealthiest and Most Influential People of Ukraine:

Over the years of Ukrainian independence, the word ‘Oligarch’ acquired negative connotations in the heads of Ukrainian citizens. The only things Ukrainians associate with oligarchs are corruption schemes, embezzlement, and criminal “show-downs”.

Today, you have the chance to change the people’s attitudes towards you, by taking their side in order to stop the bloodshed. We all understand that you have critically important economic leverage against Yanukovych, we all know that after losing your support, he will be forced to stop the bloodshed, because finances are the only resource that enable Yanukovych to wage war on his people today.

We appeal to you to cease any and all support of the current government, declare a complete economic and psychological boycott to its representatives, and present the following demands to Yanukovych:

1. Immediate constitutional reform in Ukraine, with regard to the conclusions of the Venice Commission.

2. Creation of a new technocratic government, headed by an influential, apolitical person. The government must consist of the best professional without political affiliations and political ambitions.

3. Dissolution of Verkhovna Rada [Parliament] as an authority that failed to take responsibility and resolve the conflict.

4. Resignation of Yanukovych.

If you support these demands and put pressure on Yanukovych to meet them, you will help stop bloodshed in Ukraine, and preserve its integrity and sovereignty.

Signed, Dmytro Yarosh, leader of the Right Sector

Yuliya Smyrnova – Cease-Fire or International Scandal?

Yeah… that’s what they call a ceasefire… And this, perhaps, is not an international scandal? “This is the chevron of Russia Ministry of Internal Affairs forces, a three-color one with the two-headed eagle. People tore it off the uniform of an officer during the assault. This is the genuine proof and the world has to see it. “– that was said from the Maidan stage, then repeated in Polish and Russian. (http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2014/02/20/7015005/)

Continued here: Events of 14:00 – 15:00