Police and protesters in the Ukrainian capital Kiev were locked in a tense standoff early Thursday, as the US threatened to impose sanctions over street battles which have claimed three lives.
Police and protesters clashed again overnight, turning an area at the heart of the city into a virtual war zone with demonstrators setting fire to barricades, hurling stones and Molotov cocktails and police using tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets.
Ukrainian opposition leaders have called on President Viktor Yanukovych to announce early elections within 24 hours or face more violence on the streets.
The protesters have demanded that Mr Yanukovych dismiss the government and scrap harsh anti-protest legislation.
"You, Mr President, have the opportunity to resolve this issue," said opposition leader Vitali Klitschko, speaking to around 40,000 people in Kiev's Independence Square.
Protesters have set fire to tyres in the streets and built barricades "Early elections will change the situation without bloodshed and we will do everything to achieve that."
Medical staff in Kiev told Sky News that three people have been killed during the clashes.
Two protesters died after being shot, while another died from injuries sustained in a fall. One of the dead protesters was named locally as Serhiy Nihoyna.
Police have thrown stun grenades and broken through protesters' barricades, made from burnt-out buses.
Protesters have also lobbed petrol bombs at police as fighting continued on the city's snow-covered streets.
During confrontations on Wednesday, riot police beat and shot at protesters, volunteer medics and journalists.
Early on Thursday, there was a tense stand-off at the site of the deadly clashes as hundreds of protesters faced riot police over barricades of burning tyres and sandbags stuffed with snow.
Image said to show one of the dead, Serhiy Nihoyna (Pic: Serhiy Proskurnia) The Interior Ministry has announced that 70 protesters have been arrested.
Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said the police did not have live ammunition and that opposition leaders should be held responsible for the deaths.
The US State Department has threatened to impose sanctions against the Ukraine in response to the continued use of violence against protesters.
Spokeswoman Marie Harf said the US would continue to call upon Mr Yanukovych "to protect the democratic rights of all Ukrainians, including the rights of peaceful protest".
"I don't have more details on what those sanctions might look like, but we will continue to consider additional steps, as I said, including sanctions, in response to the use of violence," she said.
Some 200,000 took to the streets at the weekend in a show of anger over the new anti-protest laws rushed through by Mr Yanukovych.
The laws allow for jail terms of up to five years for those who blockade public buildings. They also ban protesters from wearing masks or helmets.
Meanwhile, Russia said it would not intervene, according to President Vladimir Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
"We consider we do not have the right to intervene in any way in the internal affairs of our brother Ukraine. That's unacceptable and Russia has not done this and will not do it," he said in an interview published on the website of Komsomolskaya Pravda daily.
:: Watch Sky News live on television, on Sky channel 501, Virgin Media channel 602, Freeview channel 82 and Freesat channel 202.
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