Militiamen keep back demonstrators

COMM UNIAN ARCHIVE Militiamen keep back demonstrators on Taras Shevchenko’s birthday, Kiev, March 9, 2001. That day militiamen and officers of special subdivisions cordoned off Taras Shevchenko’s park to prevent opposition representatives pass in and disturb the President, Prime Minister and vice-Speaker laying flowers to Taras Shevchenko’s Monument. However, Leonid Kuchma arrived hour and a half earlier. That is why opposition representatives could not make their way to Taras Shevchenko’s Monument though the cordons. That day the first essential collision between representatives of the oppositional action “Ukraine without Kuchma” and militia took place. 205 persons were detained. Photo by Viktor Pobedinsky / UNIAN