KIEV:

Riot police guarded the Ukrainian presidential administration building yesterday, with paper flowers placed on their shields by pro-European Union activists.

The guards were brought in as jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko ended a hunger strike after 12 days.

Ex-prime minister Tymoshenko, jailed in 2011 over a gas deal with Russia, began the strike in protest at the government refusing a trade deal with the European Union.