KIEV, Nov. 25 – Former President Viktor Yanukovych said Friday he regrets he did not impose martial law and order troops to disperse the mass protests that toppled his government and forced him into exile in Russia.

“My main mistake was that I was not resolute enough to sign an order,” Yanukovych told dozens of journalists at a news conference in Rostov of Russia, The New York Times reported. “But even today, I would not sign this order because Ukrainewas divided then and that would unleash a civil war.”

The protests began late in 2013 when Yanukovych’s government announced that it was suspending its plans to sign a trade deal with the European Union and that it would instead seek closer economic ties with Russia.

The demonstrations, centered in Maidan Square in Kiev, grew in size and intensity, attracting international attention. But it was the shooting of scores of protesters in February 2014 as they tried to enter the government district that drew widespread condemnation and led many of Yanukovych’s political allies to abandon him. Security forces, after hearing that they would be blamed for the shootings and that protesters had seized hundreds of guns, left the capital.

Yanukovych fled Kiev, and Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, sent special forces to bring him to Russia. Moscow contended that Yanukovych’s downfall had been the result of a Western-inspired coup and threw its support to a revolt then taking shape Ukraine’s east.

More than 9,600 people have died in clashes there between Ukraine’s government and rebel forces, according to the United Nations.

Earlier on Friday, Yanukovych visited a courthouse in Rostov, where he tried to testify via a video link in the Ukrainian trial of five former special forces police officers charged with shooting protesters.

After 20 minutes of proceedings, the trial was adjourned because Ukrainian nationalists in Kiev had prevented the five suspects from leaving a detention center. Yanukovych is now expected to testify on Monday.

At the news conference, Yanukovych and his lawyer accused the Ukrainian government of deliberately dragging out the trial in order to prevent him from telling an alternative version of what had happened. He said he had collected three volumes of evidence that proved his argument that he had nothing to do with the shootings.

Ukraine’s interior minister, Arsen Avakov, called Yanukovych’s actions “another provocation organized by a puppet of Moscow.” (nyt/ez)