More than 2.000 members of pro-Russian forces on Sunday attacked the police headquarters in Odesa, a city in southern Ukraine, where forty people died on Friday, mostly from that camp, the AFP agency reports, citing its reporter.
The attackers, armed with clubs, first broke through the gate with two trucks.
Under their pressure, their like-minded people arrested on Friday after a deadly clash between pro-Russian forces and supporters of a united Ukraine were released. The crowd came in front of the police building with Russian flags and Orthodox icons, smashed the windows of the building and police vehicles, but they failed to break through the reinforced doors of the building behind which the policemen hid.
After some time, the police officers announced the release of ten detainees who then came out, and the crowd welcomed them with enthusiasm. The siege of the police station eased, but the crowd only retreated a few hundred meters down the street.
The separatists have also announced that they will march on the capital of Ukraine, Kyiv.
Yatsenyuk: The massacre is part of the Russian plan to destroy Ukraine
The violence in Odesa that left forty dead on Friday is part of the "Russian plan to destroy Ukraine", Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said on Sunday.
"What happened in Odessa is part of the Russian Federation's plan to destroy Ukraine and the Ukrainian state," he said at a press conference in Odessa, after a series of meetings with local authorities and citizens' associations.
"Russia has sent people here to cause chaos, but the country must unite and reconcile so as not to give the terrorists supported by Moscow the opportunity to divide our people," Yatsenyuk said.
"Russia's goal is to repeat what happened in Odessa in the east of the country," said the Prime Minister. "It is a plan financed and organized by professionals to manipulate ordinary people, and our unity will be the best answer to those terrorists".
Yatsenyuk announced that after the May 2nd massacre, all high-ranking city police officials were dismissed and will be replaced by others, because they failed in their task. In a black suit and a black tie as a sign of mourning, Arseniy Yatsenyuk expressed his condolences to the families of the victims and promised that "the judiciary will launch an investigation to determine who did not fulfill his duty".
According to police, 42 people were killed in Odessa on Friday during clashes between supporters of a united Ukraine and pro-Russian separatists. Among them are dozens of members of pro-Russian forces. According to an AFP reporter, the violence began when several hundred pro-Russian separatists attacked a procession of supporters of the pro-European authorities in Kiev, and then barricaded themselves in the House of Unions, where, under still unclear circumstances, a fire soon broke out. There are reports that the building was set on fire by supporters of the pro-European authorities in Kyiv.
Churkin: Fascists burned people
Russia's Permanent Representative to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, wrote on his Twitter account that fascists burned people in Odessa, not Ukrainians, RIA Novosti reported.
"When people are burned, it is difficult to say that they are all the same, that they are of the same blood, that they are Ukrainians. No, those who burned people are not Ukrainians. They are fascists," the Russian diplomat wrote.
According to him, the situation in Ukraine is extremely unstable and it is necessary to carry out a detailed investigation of what is happening in the southeast of that country.
"On the roads of Ukraine today, young men with automatic weapons are walking and brutally robbing their people. There is a racket in the cities. The governance of the country has disappeared," said Churkin.
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