Opposition leaders emerged empty-handed from talks with Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovich, with no immediate hope of ending the escalation of months of unrest.  Opposition leader Vitali Klitschko says he fears the death toll will grow.

“I earnestly wish that there will be no bloodshed and that people are not killed.  I will survive, but I am afraid there will be deaths, I am afraid of this,” the former heavyweight boxer Klitschko told protesters manning barricades in Kiev’s Independence Square – an area that now looks more like the fictional Mordor with burning rubber around blockades, garbage and wreckage strewn all about.  Klitschko is urging activists to try and stay calm.

At least five protesters have died.  Three were killed Wednesday, and two of them dying of bullet wounds during clashes of hard-core and extremist elements versus riot cops.  Scores of others on both sides have been injured – many of them with eye injuries caused by flying projectiles and police rubber bullets.

Meanwhile, the last leader of the Soviet Union doesn’t like what’s happened.  Mikhail Gorbachev urged the Presidents Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin to help broker negotiations to end violent protests in Ukraine, which he said was facing a possible “catastrophe”.  The EU is also calling for action to end the violence.