Ukraina valde Ryssland före EU - stora protester som följd, länkar i inlägg2

Pro-Russia activists clashed with supporters of the new Ukrainian government in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Saturday and tried to seize the regional governor's headquarters, Interfax news agency said.

The agency said that several thousand people had gathered outside the building, and some broke in and raised the Russian flag.

Detail from the earlier news flash (12.55), that Ukraine's prime minister says the pro-Russia ruler of Crimea is not legitimate.

Interim president Oleksandr Turchynov issued a statement instructing "the cabinet of ministers of Ukraine and other government agencies not to view (Sergiy) Aksyonov as a representative of the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea."

Unknown armed men from Kiev have tried to seize the Crimean Interior Ministry overnight, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement. It's as Crimea's PM urges Russia to help cope with the crisis, ensuring "peace and calm" in the region.

“Thanks to the decisive action of self-defense squads, the attempt to seize the building of the Interior Ministry was derailed. This attempt confirms the intention of prominent political circles in Kiev to destabilize the situation on the peninsula,” the statement added.

Earlier, Crimea's Prime Minister Sergey Aksyonov declared that firearms have been used in the clashes in the region, Itar-Tass news agency reported. The PM said the local Ministers' Council and Supreme Court came under an attack.

German, French and British governments have urged President Vladimir Putin to explain what Russian troops will do in Ukraine, after Russian soldiers seized key buildings in the Ukrainian border province of Crimea.

In the past two days the Crimean Parliament and an airport have been occupied by troops.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier gave Putin a warning:

"Whoever pours more oil onto the flames now, with words or actions, is consciously aiming for further escalation."

"We are holding the Russian government to its public statements… this entails also that Russia provides without delay complete transparency over the movements of its troops in Crimea, as well as its goals and intentions."

The Foreign Ministers of Britain and France have both asked for a "de-escalation" in Ukraine and asked Russia to respect Ukraine's integrity.

MOSCOW, February 26 (RIA Novosti) – Russian President Vladimir Putin has reached his highest approval rating since he returned to the Kremlin in 2012, a new poll reported Wednesday.

The survey by the state-run pollster VTsIOM found that 67.7 percent of Russians approved of Putin’s work as head of state.

The survey center said that the peak in popularity was “related to the results of the Olympic Games in Sochi, as well as the effect of comparison to the political unrest and specter of civil war in Ukraine.”