KIEV, July 16 – A group of activists rallied in front of a police station in Fastiv on Tuesday, saying that police officers have repeatedly resorted to torturing detainees at the facility.

The activists, some of whom had participated in an attack on a police station in Vradiiyvka in Mykolayiv region earlier this month, demanded access to the facilities and to punish those responsible.

“The protesters will stay overnight near the station,” Serhiy Kaplin, a lawmaker from the opposition Udar party, who accompanied the activists, said. “We demand that those law enforcers that have been involved in the torturing must bear responsibility.”

The activists, which are on a march across Ukraine against police brutality, plan to walk from Vradiyivka to Kiev in a protest demanding the resignation of Internal Affairs Minister Vitaliy Zakharchenko.

This is the third incident involving standoff between the protesters and the police in two weeks following reports that two police officers in Vradiyivka have assaulted a young woman by raping and beating her nearly to death.

A group of protesters broke a fence and clashed with police forces at a police station in Kiev on Friday, an indication that the protest has been spreading.

Zakharchenko, a close ally of President Viktor Yanukovych, has been facing a rising pressure to step down following a number of reported cases of police brutality. The cases include an attack on reporters by a mob in May despite heavy presence of police, which had refused to protect the victims.

Zakharchenko was grilled in Parliament with opposition groups accusing him of a cover-up and demanding his resignation. The pressure worsened in July after the report of rape and attempted murder allegedly committed by the two police offices in Mykolayiv region.

But despite the growing pressure, Zakharchenko took some time off starting July 15 and his duties are fulfilled by the first deputy minister, according to his spokesman.

“This is a regular time off. It will last for as long as the minister decides it to be,” the spokesman said.

But others were more sarcastic.

“Minister Zakharchenko has taken a vacation, perhaps for a month. Why not? The summer is hot, the beach, and it’s quiet,” Mustafa Nayem, an Ukrayinska Pravda reporter, wrote in his blog.

Zakharchenko’s allies from the Regions Party in Parliament said Tuesday that lawmakers will should to come up with a bill that would increase punishment for those people that join attacks against police stations.

“We’re preparing the papers for the bill the increases the punishment for attacks aagainst police officers,” Mykola Dzhyga, a lawmakers from the Regions Party, said.

Volodymyr Oliynyk, another fellow Regions Party lawmaker, said that Zakharchenko should stay at the job, but should seek to reform the 250,000-strong police force.

"Changing leadership will not solve the problem so the minister should keep working,” Oliynyk said. (tl/ez)