16:35 02.02.2015

Aidar battalion fighters block Defense Ministry's premises in Kyiv

2 min read
Aidar battalion fighters block Defense Ministry's premises in Kyiv

Several dozen men in army fatigues blocked traffic opposite the entrance into the grounds of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry in Povitroflotsky Avenue in Kyiv on Monday.

They set tires ablaze, but a while later an emergency service vehicle drove out of the ministry's courtyard and put out the fire, an Interfax correspondent reported.

The assembled demand either the defense minister, Stepan Poltorak, or the chief of the General Staff, Viktor Muzhenko, come out and talk to them.

Asked by Interfax whether any official is going to emerge from the building, the ministry's spokeswoman Viktoria Kushnir said: "The thing is, they don't want to hear anyone, they want to protest."

Meanwhile, the demonstrators have tried to break into the internal courtyard of the ministry. One of them climbed over the fence. The security guards at the checkpoint outside the ministry have closed the gates, preventing the protestors from getting into the ministry's grounds.

Among the demonstrators were fighters from the Aidar battalion who were planning a picket this Monday.

"The situation there is more or less normal, there is no fighting, no one was arrested or injured," a Kyiv police spokesperson told Interfax.

The police confirmed that the protestors had blocked traffic on one of the thoroughfares.

It was reported earlier that last Friday Aidar battalion fighters had been picketing the defense ministry since morning over a scandal that involved the battalion's lost seal, re-writing of documentation and the renaming of the military unit.

Aidar commander Serhiy Melnychuk said the volunteer battalion "officially no longer exists."

Initially the Aidar battalion was formed by volunteers. Later it became part of the Defense Ministry, but some volunteers were either left out or refused to join. Now the Defense Ministry is making some organizational changes in the battalion because of the loss of its seal, but activists have opposed the initiative.

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