President Viktor Yanukovych and his appointed government is fast losing any shred of credibility with the West which has called for dialogue to be used instead of force to resolve an escalating political crisis in Ukraine.
Western leaders deplored last night’s use of police action
to clear areas in and around Independence Square just hours after the European
Union’s top diplomat Catherine Ashton had visited with political opposition
leaders and protesters there. The measures also came as a top U.S. diplomat,
Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, was in town for a meeting with
Yanukovych.
Ten were detained, according to opposition lawmakers, while police
said eight protesters were arrested and some released later. Kyiv Post
reporters on the scene saw police clubbing protesters, including one repeatedly
dressed in a Batkivshchyna jacket.
Ukraine’s interior ministry said it was acting on a court
order to clear the area and added that law enforcement were injured in clashes
with protesters.
“I’m
still in Kyiv. I was among you on Maidan in the evening and was impressed by
the determination of Ukrainians demonstrating for a European perspective of the
country,” said Ashton in a statement. “Some hours later I observe with
sadness that police uses force to remove peaceful people from the center of
Kyiv. The authorities didn’t need to act under the coverage of night to engage
with the society by using police. Dialogue with political forces and
society and use of arguments is always better than the argument of force.”
The U.S. Secretary of State used unusually strong language in
denouncing the attempted police breakup. Riot police and National Guardsmen succeeded
in temporarily surrounding two public buildings that protesters have occupied
and removed several barricades.
“The United States expresses its disgust with
the decision of Ukrainian authorities to meet the peaceful protest in Kyiv’s
Maidan Square with riot police…and batons, rather than with respect for
democratic rights and human dignity, read the statement. “This response is
neither acceptable nor does it befit a democracy.”
Leaders in the West and three former Ukrainian
presidents have called on political dialogue to resolve the standoff, which
started on Nov. 21 when the government rejected a far-reaching political
association and free trade deal with the EU. Protesters took to Independence
Square but were brutally dispersed on the morning of Nov. 30 by riot police
after round-the-clock demonstrations. The excessive show of force triggered an
outpouring of hundreds of thousands of protesters the next day, and their
numbers swelled to 500,000-1 million on Dec. 8.
“The use of force against peaceful
demonstrators in Kyiv is unjustified, and a direct responsibility for this lies
with the political leadership of Ukraine, Lithuanian President Dalia
Grybauskaite said in a statement on Dec. 11
German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle also
asked the Ukrainian government to refrain from violence in his Dec.11
statement: “In a democracy, peaceful demonstrations cannot simply be banned and
put paid to with violence. The protests are an active expression of the
people’s desire for a European Ukraine.
“Instead of a ban on
protests and the clearing of Maidan Square, a real political dialogue must now
be launched, not just continually promised. That the European Union and the
Council of Europe are prepared to help in this endeavour is known in Kyiv.”
Kyiv Post editor Mark Rachkevych can be reached
at [email protected].
