KIEV, December 08, 5:15 /ITAR-TASS/. The Ukrainian opposition intends to convene by noon (14:00 Moscow time) on Sunday a next people’s assembly (veche) on Independence Square in the centre of the Ukrainian capital. A massive action in this format, when the supporters of European integration come to the country’s capital from all Ukrainian regions, primarily western Ukraine, is held already for the third time for the last 17 days.
“This will be the third stage of the Ukrainian action in the struggle for our rights,” leader of the Batkivshchina (Fatherland) party Arseniy Yatsenyuk said on the eve of a people’s assembly.
Leader of the UDAR party Vitaly Klitschko has set a high target turnout for the people’s assembly. “There should be more than a million of us at the people’s assembly,” he stated. Klitschko urged those who will not be able to come to Kiev “to go out on the squares in their cities and show their desire to live in a modern European country named Ukraine.”
Meanwhile, according to the reports that the Interior Ministry has made public, about 10,000 protesters have met on Independence Square and about 3,000 people - at the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, on Saturday.
The propagandistic campaign for the people’s assembly in Kiev began back on Friday. The groups of activists from the Ukrainian union of youth were standing along the Ring Road, Brovarsky Avenue and Pobedy Avenue with the posters “Tomorrow to Maidan at 12:00” The agitation for the action was also reported near major shopping centres and the metro stations.
The opposition leaders have voiced the main ideas of their speeches at the forthcoming people’s assembly back on Saturday. For instance, Yatsenyuk told reporters in ‘the headquarters of resistance’ that the talks with the incumbent authorities over the settlement of a political and economic crisis in the country are possible only after President Viktor Yanukovich meets three demands: dismiss the government, bring to justice those guilty of a forcible dispersal of the students on November 30 and to release the detainees, who participated in a peaceful action on Independence Square. “Any talks can begin only after Viktor Yanukovich fulfils three first demands, which the Ukrainian opposition and millions of Ukrainians had set for him,” Yatsenyuk said. Further plans of the opposition are to form a technical government, which should sign an association agreement with the European Union and should receive the financial aid from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and European institutions as well as early presidential and parliamentary elections after some changes are introduced in the Ukrainian Constitution.
Meanwhile, the Party of Regions faction has made a statement in the Ukrainian parliament on Saturday evening that the dialogue with the opposition is needed to find a solution to the critical situation. The Party of Regions is prepared to set up a negotiating group to improve the situation in Kiev, but the opposition should stop the blockade of the governmental buildings, isolate the saboteurs and calm down the protesters. The authors of the statement called on the Ukrainians to come out for the preservation of the constitutional system, law and public order in the country.