Avakov blamed the clashes on the Svoboda get together, which polled lower than 5 % in final yr’s parliamentary election, and its chief, Oleg Tyahnybok, who stood aspect by aspect with the inside minister through the anti-government protests that toppled then-president Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014.

For her part, EU foreign relations chief Federica Mogherini, said on Monday that Ukraine’s reform “process shouldn’t be jeopardised by violence”.

The ministry said that almost 90 national guardsmen were injured.

With the decentralisation bill, Mr Poroshenko, who was due to address the nation last night, found himself in a tight spot.

The European Union, Russia, the United States, France and Germany expressed their disquiet.

“The president ended up in a hard situation”, Vadym Karasyov, head of the Institute of Global Strategies in Kiev, said.

“There would have been a real possibility of us being left alone with the aggressor”, he said.

But Nicholson on Tuesday issued a statement saying that Putin was responsible for the violence caused by the anti-Russian extremists.

Armored Kraz Cougar patrol cars carrying eight officers each will periodically patrol Kiev along four different routes into the centre of the city, as debate in parliament continues today over a proposed amendment to the constitution that would give greater autonomy to the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, which are partially held by pro-Russian separatists.

Some of them were masked. Some shouted “Shame!”

Sporadic shelling and shooting, which each side has blamed on the other, had ensured a steadily mounting death toll – despite the ceasefire called as part of a peace plan worked out in Minsk, Belarus, in February.

Ukrainian nationalists struggle with riot police in Kiev during a protest in which shots were fired and a grenade thrown.

Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said some 30 protesters, including the one who threw a grenade at policemen, were detained.

Some of the injured lay bleeding on the ground in front of the parliament building, with many suffering injuries to their arms and legs. Since March of previous year, when the government in Ukraine was initially overthrown by an administration more sympathetic to the West, those in the east of Ukraine felt as if they had been cheated of a government that they had elected and supported.

A member of the National Guard died on the operating table Monday, killed when a grenade fragment reached his heart. Motuzyanyk also said there were no casualties overnight.

The city authorities said two journalists were also hurt.

Kiev police said 18 people, including a member of Svoboda’s paramilitary wing accused of firing a grenade, were in detention.

The tensions in central Kiev were fuelled as the parliament was due to vote on constitutional amendments on decentralization, which are expected to give more autonomy to Lugansk and Donetsk regions, controlled by independence-seeking insurgents. The government pointed the finger at radicals from far-right political groups like ultra-nationalist Svoboda (Freedom).