Ukraine Tests Truce as Skirmishes Erupt; Talks to Resume

Bloomberg: The truce declared by Ukrainian PresidentViktor Yanukovych and opposition leaders is being tested after a bloody spiral of violence forced the leader to grant sweeping powers to the army and police.

The government and the opposition will continue talks to stop the bloodshed today, opposition leader Vitali Klitschko, a former world boxing champion, said on his website. Ukraine’s Interior Ministry accused a sniper in the protest camp of wounding 20 police with gunfire. Skirmishes erupted as protesters burned tires and threw fireworks and rocks, and police sent stun grenades into their midst.

Reeling from the deadliest clashes in a three-month standoff, the Russian-backed leader’s security service started a nationwide anti-terrorism operation to restore order and protect borders. That gives the military the right to search, detain and even fire on civilians, the Defense Ministrysaid.

“Imposing martial law requires parliament’s approval, but an anti-terrorist operation can be declared simply by informing the president,” said Oleksiy Melnyk, an analyst at the Razumkov Center in Kiev. “Authorities now have the right to arrest people, search homes and a whole range of other things in a way that would otherwise be illegal. The leader of the operation’s name is secret and all involved get immunity.”

Yanukovych yesterday fired army chief Volodymyr Zaman and replaced him with the head of the navy without explanation.

Army Powers

During an anti-terrorism operation, soldiers can also legally search civilian vehicles and stop car and pedestrian traffic, according to the Defense Ministry. The security service said in the statement that protesters have seized more than 1,500 guns and 100,000 rounds of ammunition from military bases, depots and government buildings, without elaborating.

Earlier attempts at reconciliation, with both sides calling for concessions, failed. Violence flared up this week when protesters sought to march on parliament to pressure lawmakers to curb Yanukovych’s powers -- a demand that the president has refused to meet.

U.S. President Barack Obama warned Ukraine’s military yesterday not to intervene in the conflict, saying the government should be responsible for dealing with “peaceful protesters.” Ukraine’s military, which had 800,000 people when the Soviet Union fell in 1991, has been reduced to 182,000 people after two decades of budget cuts.

‘Civil War’

Lawmakers in Lviv on the Polish border yesterday ousted their Yanukovych-appointed governor, established an autonomous government and declared allegiance to the opposition in Kiev. Protesters seized government and security headquarters in at least four other regions, while Poland’s premier warned of civil war and European leaders threatened sanctions.

“We may be witnessing the first hour of a civil war,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told lawmakers in Warsaw yesterday. “If people are dying and being injured during protests, it’s the authorities who are responsible.”

Yanukovych on Feb. 18 moved to end the crisis that has destabilized the country of 45 million, a key route for Russian gas exports to Europe. At least 28 people have died and hundreds were injured in the clashes, the Healthy Ministry said on its website.

‘Outrageous Violation’

The opposition “crossed the line when they called people to arms,” Yanukovych said on his website yesterday. “This is an outrageous violation of the law. My advisers happen to be trying to talk me into a tough scenario, the use of force. But I have always considered the use of force a false route.”

Ukrainian bonds and stocks slumped. The yield on the government’s $1 billion of notes maturing in June jumped 12 percentage points to a record 35 percent yesterday. The Ukrainian Equities Index fell for a second day, losing 4.2 percent. The cost of insuring Ukraine’s debt for five years against non-payment using credit default swaps rose to the highest since July 2009.

The violence drew a sharp reaction from global leaders. The European Union moved toward freezing the assets of Ukraine’s most powerful officials. The bloc’s foreign ministers will meet today to weigh “all possible options,” including “restrictive measures against those responsible for repression,” EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said in an e-mailed statement from Brussels.

Obama, Putin

Obama said yesterday that the people of Ukraine want “basic freedoms -- freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, fair and free elections, the ability to run a business without paying a bribe, to not be discriminated against because of your religion or your beliefs.” Russian President Vladimir Putin, he said, “has a different view on many of those issues.”

Russia blames “extremists” and “radical elements” for the escalation of violence, Putin’s spokesman,Dmitry Peskov, said on a conference call with reporters yesterday. While Putin had a phone conversation with Yanukovych last night, he didn’t give advice on how to handle the crisis, Peskov said.

Violence has spread throughout western Ukraine. Protesters stormed police buildings in Ternopil and Ivano-Frankivsk, burned the offices of the ruling parties in Lutsk and seized the government’s headquarters in Zakarpattia. Trains going from Lviv and other western cities to Kiev are stopped because of maintenance issues, the press office of Ukrzaliznytsia, the state railway company, said on its website.

Throughout the night, protesters kept feeding fires ringing their camp to maintain a barrier against government forces. Several more buildings around Independence Square caught fire, including the National Music Conservatory as fireworks and stun grenades exploded from time to time in sky.

‘No Way’

“There’s no way we leave, because we have nothing to lose anymore,” said Mykola, who declined to give his last name for fear of reprisal. “Everyone who spent the night here can already count on a dozen years in prison.”

The opposition is seeking to overturn constitutional changes that strengthened Yanukovych’s powers and to put Ukraine on a path toward EU membership. The standoff began on Nov. 21, when Yanukovych pulled out of a free-trade deal with the EU, opting instead for $15 billion of Russian aid and cheaper gas.

“There’s probably a will to involve the army in this conflict,” Viktor Sokolov, deputy head of the Gorshenin Institute in Kiev, said by phone yesterday. “Before today’s change, the army might not have been as loyal to the president as he would have liked. This explains the reshuffle.”

 reporters on this story: Aliaksandr Kudrytski in Kiev