You're reading: Kharkiv police foils Communist protest attempt, about 20 arrested

Kharkiv - Police in Kharkiv foiled an attempt by the local committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine to stage a march and rally in the city on Saturday.

Just as people started gathering near the Mirror Stream fountain, a bailiff read out a resolution banning the event, an Interfax correspondent said.

After demonstrators made an attempt to begin the march, police started pushing the assembled aside, opposite the Freedom Square towards which the Communists were planning to proceed.

The attempt to stage an improvised rally on the spot was also foiled.

Law enforcers arrested the first secretary of the Communist Party regional committee, Alla Oleksandrivska, and several more people. The exact number of those arrested is not known at this stage.

Some have now assembled near the fountain, without be taking any vigorous action, though.

For his part, Ukraine’s Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said 20 people have been arrested.

“Police have arrested twenty people who violated the ban on this anti-Ukrainian rally. Among them is the chief Kharkiv Communist woman and ex-people’s deputy Alla Oleksandrivska,” he wrote on his Facebook page.