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In Ukraine, 5 Wounded in Scuffles Between Protesters
Russia Defers Aid to Ukraine, and Unrest Persists
(about 5 hours later)
KIEV, Ukraine — Five people were wounded on Wednesday in fighting between two factions of antigovernment protesters inside one of the city’s occupied government buildings, Ukrainian news media reported.
KIEV, Ukraine — A former Ukrainian president warned on Wednesday that the country is now on “the brink of civil war,” and Russia added to the gloom by announcing the suspension of its financial aid package, which was all that had been keeping Ukraine solvent.
The scuffle came as the opposition’s more moderate political leadership faced pressure to demonstrate greater control on the streets, in exchange for concessions from the government. Parliament is also considering an amnesty law for detained protesters that linked an amnesty with the clearing of occupied buildings.
Leonid M. Kravchuk, Ukraine’s president from 1991 to 1994, issued his warning while offering his services to Parliament in mediating negotiations between the government and opposition leaders on overhauling the Constitution to weaken the power of President Viktor F. Yanukovych.
The five were wounded inside the occupied main building of the Ministry of Agriculture, Channel 5 television reported. These included injuries from rubber bullets fired by protesters at one another from what are known as traumatic pistols, or nonlethal handguns, legally sold for self-defense here, which have previously been used only against the police.
But Parliament halted work for the evening without voting on the constitutional change or another measure to assuage tension.
In a speech in Parliament on Wednesday, Leonid M. Kravchuk, Ukraine’s president from 1991 to 1994, warned that the country was “on the brink of civil war.”
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had told European Union leaders at a summit meeting Tuesday in Brussels that his government intended to fulfill its financial aid commitments to Ukraine in spite of negotiations here that could put a pro-Western government in power. Mr. Putin said the $15 billion aid package was for the Ukrainian “people.”
On Tuesday, Ukraine’s prime minister, Mykola Azarov, resigned and a pro-government political party, the Party of Regions, voted together with the opposition to repeal most of the laws in a package of legislation that was passed earlier this month limiting freedom of speech and assembly.
But that stance was reversed at a cabinet meeting in Moscow on Wednesday, where Mr. Putin brought up the subject of the aid, saying, “I ask the government to carry out these agreements in full.”
Serhei Arbuzov, a former deputy prime minister, assumed the position of acting prime minister on Wednesday, though other members of the cabinet remained in their posts in a temporary capacity.
But his prime minister, Dmitri A. Medvedev, suggested that it would be reasonable to fulfill the agreements “only when we know what economic policies the new government will implement, who will be working there, and what rules they will follow.”
In an opening speech to the cabinet, he expressed regret for the beating of journalists — acknowledging what was probably a tactical mistake by the police, given the challenge now for the government in conveying a positive message through the capital’s news media. In the past week alone, 42 journalists were wounded, Channel 5 reported, including many apparently targeted for carrying cameras.
Mr. Putin quickly agreed, saying, “That’s reasonable.” A report by the Itar-Tass news agency said this indicated a decision to halt the aid, meaning Ukraine would not receive a $2 billion payment expected by Friday.
“I’m sorry that a lot of people suffered, including journalists,” Mr. Arbuzov said.
Political commentators said there were other signs that Russia was raising the economic pressure on Ukraine, seemingly to discourage Mr. Yanukovych from compromising with the opposition.
The government’s concessions put pressure on the parliamentary opposition leaders associated with the protest to answer with a de-escalation of their own, and could highlight their growing irrelevance if they are unable to deliver. Multiple right-wing factions, splinter groups and newly formed associations are now active on the street without organized leadership and are not answering to the political parties.
Echoing statements made in 2006 and 2009 before shipments of natural gas to Ukraine were stopped, a deputy director of Gazprom, the state-owned natural gas export monopoly, said Ukraine had failed to make payments on a $2.7 billion debt.
Activists from one such group, Spilna Sprava, or Common Cause, seized the main building of the Ministry of Agriculture on Friday, and had resisted surrendering control to a broader group of protesters that included representatives of the parliamentary opposition parties.
Russian customs officials began heightened checks on trucks crossing the border from Ukraine, and an association of Ukrainian truckers told members to expect delays from 10 to 15 working days.
The task of taking control fell to activists from Svoboda, the nationalist party in Parliament and a onetime ally of Common Cause, though the two organizations have disagreed during the protests. After talks overnight failed to bring results, Svoboda activists ejected Common Cause from the building on Wednesday.
Standard & Poor’s, the ratings agency, on Tuesday downgraded Ukraine’s sovereign debt, citing political uncertainty and the prospect that the protests would succeed in installing a pro-Western government, resulting in a probable cancellation of the Russian financing that was suspended Wednesday.
“Because we need to free the arrested activists, the decision was taken to clear the territory of the building of the Ministry of Agriculture,” a spokesman for Svoboda, Yuri Syrotyuk, told the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper. “Now this decision is being fulfilled.”
Without Russian aid or a Western substitute, Ukraine will be forced to default on its debt or devalue its currency, the hryvnia.
To try to bring order to the bands of young men, opposition leaders on Wednesday announced the formation of a National Guard that would unite the many organizations, and several agreed to join, including Right Sector, an umbrella organization of right-wing groups active in street politics, and Maidan Self-Defense, an organization that arranges the defense of barricades.
After five people were wounded on Wednesday in fighting between two factions of antigovernment protesters inside one of the city’s occupied government buildings, protest organizers announced the formation of an umbrella command for street bands, to be called a National Guard.
The Parliament, or Verkhovna Rada, debated the amnesty bill but had not voted on it by late Wednesday evening.
The scuffle came as the opposition’s more moderate political leadership faced pressure to demonstrate greater control on the streets, in exchange for concessions from the government. Parliament on Wednesday passed an amnesty bill covering protesters arrested in clashes with the police that will take effect only after protesters leave occupied administrative buildings.
Lawmakers are also expected to take up a bill that would form a committee to overhaul the Constitution to weaken the power of the president.
Members of the nationalist party Svoboda fought to eject activists from a group called Common Cause from the main building of the Agriculture Ministry, then both factions left the building, allowing the police to again guard the upper floors. The move appeared to represent a concession from the opposition, after Ukraine’s prime minister, Mykola Azarov, had resigned on Tuesday.
Though the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, had said at a summit meeting with European Union officials in Brussels on Tuesday that his government would follow through on a $15 billion package of financial aid to Ukraine, on Wednesday he and Russia’s prime minister, Dmitri A. Medvedev, said the payments would be halted until a new government was formed in Kiev.
The fighting among protesters inside, though, had been intense. It involved so-called traumatic guns, or nonlethal pistols firing rubber bullets. Afterward, the stairs were slicked with water from the building’s firefighting system, apparently also used in the melee, and broken glass and furniture littered the halls.
Speaking to Russian ministers, Mr. Putin said Wednesday, “I would like to draw the attention of the government to concerns of our Ukrainian colleagues and friends, specifically on the necessity of fulfilling all our agreements in the financial sphere,” the Itar-Tass news agency reported.
Protesters for weeks had suspected that the government was using location data from cellphones near the demonstration to pinpoint people for political profiling, and they received alarming confirmation when a court formally ordered a telephone company to hand over such data.
Mr. Medvedev then added that it would be reasonable to do so “only when we understand the economic course of the new government, who will work in that government, and rules it will follow.”
Earlier this month, protesters at a clash with riot police received text messages on their phones saying they had been “registered as a participant in a mass disturbance.”
Under the Ukrainian Constitution, the Parliament has two months to approve a new cabinet of ministers, during which time acting ministers can remain in their positions.
Then, three cellphone companies — Kyivstar, MTS and Life — denied that they had provided the location data to the government or had sent the text messages. Kyivstar suggested that it was instead the work of a “pirate” cellphone tower set up in the area.
A deputy director of Gazprom, the natural gas export monopoly, told the Rossiya 24 news channel that Ukraine had failed to make payments on a $2.7 billion debt for gas supplies. Russian customs officials began heightened checks on trucks crossing the border from Ukraine; an association of Ukrainian truckers told its members to expect delays of 10 to 15 working days to complete customs inspections.
In a ruling made public on Wednesday, a city court ordered Kyivstar to disclose to the police which cellphones were turned on during an antigovernment protest outside the courthouse on Jan. 10.
Standard & Poor’s, the ratings agency, on Tuesday downgraded Ukraine’s sovereign debt even deeper into the categories of speculative, or junk, bonds, citing the political uncertainty and the prospect that the protests will succeed in installing a pro-Western government, resulting in a probable end to Russian financing that is keeping the country solvent for now. The agency rates Ukraine’s debt at CCC, with a negative outlook.
The order applied only to this one site on one day, and did not cover the area of the main protest, Independence Square, where sometimes more than 100,000 people have shown up, most presumably carrying cellphones whose location there could identify them as political opponents of the government.
