. A Pro-European Union activist prays as riot police going to storm an opposition tent camps on the Independence Square in Kiev, Ukraine, Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2013. Security forces clashed with protesters as they began tearing down opposition barricades and tents set up in the center of the Ukrainian capital early Wednesday, in an escalation of the weeks-long standoff threatening the leadership of President Viktor Yanukovych. (AP Photo/Sergei Chuzavkov)