(Transcript from World News Radio)
Ukraine's government says the military has begun an 'anti-terror' operation in the eastern city of Sloviansk.
Ukraine's interior minister said one helicopter pilot had been killed and other people wounded by anti-aircraft missile fire from pro-Russian rebels.
It comes after thousands of pro- Russian demonstrators took to the streets and seized the local prosecutor's office.
The pro-western government in Kiev, which accuses Russia of orchestrating the violence, has admitted it can't control the rebellion - which has spread to at least a dozen cities.
SBS Dateline's Nick Lazaredes is in Donetsk.
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It started with chants...
But police were clearly very worried...
Before long mayday turned to mayhem in Donetsk.
Riot police doing battle with protestors... Trying to protect the prosecutor's office.
They attacked police with rocks and sticks as they tried to seize another government building.
As stun grenades and tear gas exploded all around them, the injured were taken to safety.
The central government's grip on power is slipping away in eastern Ukraine.
Within minutes several police were cornered, and bashed in the head and neck with rocks...clamouring under their shields.
Others simply ran for their lives.
Law and order is disappearing fast in Donetsk.
"How on earth are we supposed to deal with these kinds of things?" one officer says. "And to think they call themselves peaceful citizens."
As for the riot police trapped inside the seized building, the humiliation was even greater.
First the militants disarmed them then ejected them through a corridor of shame.
In nearby Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, pro-Russian separatists marched on the national guard building.
The mob was shouting outside the base, demanding the release of eleven pro-Russians... allegedly kidnapped by Ukrainian troops.
This woman is trembling at the thought of what might happen to her son.
"Woman: What can I say? I came back without my child. Reporter: Were they taken at the Krasnoarmeysky checkpoint? Woman: Yes. Reporter: In the morning? Today? Reporter: Who told you that they were here? Where did it come from? Woman: A friend phoned me. I was doing a night shift, he called me in the morning. Reporter: And those people who are on the other side of that grate, so to speak, what do they tell you? Woman: They're saying nothing. You can hear for yourself - they're saying nothing."
"I'm addressing all of you who can see and hear me. Isn't it Fascism in the Ukraine when they're grabbing living people? Here's a mother, weeping, here. When she comes home today, what is she going to say to her neighbours? How is she going to live now?"
Ukrainian snipers try to clear the crowd by firing warning shots.
To no avail...
A Ukrainian military helicopter appeared, sweeping low to scare them off.
This is obviously a message to the pro-Russian separatists that the Ukrainian military is not going to muck around there are still a few stragglers here waiting to see what happens but generally the crowd, there were hundreds here, have dispersed in just minutes. So clearly a message from the military that any attempt to take over bases is not going to be tolerated.
And early this morning, separatists in Slaviansk say they've come under attack by Ukrainian forces.
"I will fight with whatever I have, if not a rifle, then I'll fight with my hands and strangle these bastards so that they won't, mess on my land, (EXPLETIVE), so there will be no Nazis on this land."
Just yesterday Ukraine's acting president said his security forces were helpless to restore order in eastern Ukraine.
Now his government's introduced conscription...
The country's young men called to arms.
In Donetsk, Nick Lazaredes SBS World News
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