One of the points of the Regions' programme, that helped them gain an upper hand in Ukrainian politics, was the promise to make EU - Ukrainian relations better. Two months ago the government refused to sign the EU - Ukraine association agreement and instead went on to discuss partnership with Russia. Hundreds of thousands of people organized peaceful demonstrations demanding the signing of the EU association agreement, the elimination of corruption in government. The opposition was led by UDAR (former boxer's Vitali Klitschko's liberal party), Svoboda (Freedom in English, Ukranian nationalist, conservative party) and Fatherland (Yulia Tymoshenko's liberal conservative party).
Less than a week ago the Ukrainian government passed laws outlawing protests, effectively making the hundreds of thousands peaceful protesters criminals. Another law passed enabled security forces to use firearms loaded with real, not rubber, bullets against protesters.
Several protesters and foreign journalists were taken by the police and beaten, some died.
Once the laws were passed, several thousand protesters geared up, armed themselves with homemade weaponry, firearms, molotov cocktails and began to fight back. Some even use fireworks to burn the police officers.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/22/kiev-burning-photos_n_4645024.html