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Newly freed Ukrainian opposition icon Yulia Tymoshenko greets people as she arrives to speak at Independence Square on February 22, 2014, moments after parliament voted to hold early presidential elections in May. Ukraine’s opposition leader and former premier Yulia Tymoshenko, sentenced to a seven-year jail term in 2011 for abuse of power, was released on February 22. Tymoshenko received a rapturous welcome on Independence Square. “You are heroes, you are the best of Ukraine,” she told the 50,000-strong crowd before breaking down in tears. The latest developments in the ex-Soviet nation’s three-month political crisis came after protesters took control of Kiev’s charred city centre and seized Yanukovych’s lavish residence on a day of dramatic twists and turns. AFP PHOTO/ ANATOLII STEPANOV