A year after Ukraine's "Orange Revolution" swept Viktor Yushchenko into power new evidence has come to light about how tense the stand-off really was.
Former officers of Ukraine's secret service, the SBU, told the BBC that bloodshed had been avoided at the last minute.
They said fully armed troops were first ordered to confront the demonstrators in Kiev's Independence Square but were then dramatically told to go back to barracks 20 minutes later.
The then SBU head, Gen Ihor Smeshko, for the first time went public, saying that civil war had been avoided only after intense negotiations between representatives of the old cabinet of President Leonid Kuchma, key figures in the opposition and several ambassadors.
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