Fans of the Ukrainian football clubs Metalist and Dnipro - usually fierce rivals - came together to support a united Ukraine in a march on Sunday.
But the rally ended in yet more violence after the demonstrators clashed with pro-Russian supporters.
Video footage shows the mobs in running street battles in the city of Kharkiv, in the country's north, hurling stones and flares, and groups setting upon individuals.
The clashes came as dozens of pro-Kremlin militants seized a regional television station in the eastern city of Donetsk.
Wearing camouflage uniforms and armed with baseball bats and knives, the insurgents occupied the interior of the building on Sunday, preventing anyone entering.
Most wore a red armband bearing the name of the pro-Russian group Oplot (Bastion).
They were not carrying visible firearms but militants carried several heavy bags inside the building and refused to answer reporters' questions.
The insurgents covered the trident, Ukraine's national symbol, adorning the entrance with a sticker bearing the name of the self-proclaimed 'Donetsk Republic'.
'The journalists will be allowed to continue to work but they will have to tell the truth,' said one militant, who gave his name as Stanislav.
'The Russian channels tell the truth. We demand to have channels in Donetsk that tell the truth.'
The station headquarters will be guarded 'day and night,' he added.
Russian TV channels are banned in Ukraine, where the authorities accuse them of spreading propaganda.
The station's chief later spoke to the several international reporters gathered outside.
'Our channels have not yet changed,' Oleg Djolos said.
'Our journalists and staff are of course worried but the men who have taken control of our station have pledged to guarantee our safety,' he added.
Nearby, six Ukrainian police officers, at least three of whom were armed with Kalashnikov rifles, watched the events unfold without intervening.
Asked about this, Djolos said: 'You will have to ask them. They are Ukrainian policemen.'
The officers declined to comment.
'We will come to work at the normal time tomorrow,' the director said.
'We are a regional Ukrainian television station. We are not a broadcasting centre. The decision to broadcast one channel or the other is not taken at our level.'
When pro-Russia protesters took control of the Crimean peninsula last month, backed by Russian special forces, the TV stations were swiftly occupied in similar operations.
In another sign of the deteriorating situation in Ukraine, pro-Russian militants in camouflage fatigues and black balaclavas paraded captive European military observers before the media on Sunday, hours after three captured Ukrainian security guards were shown bloodied, blindfolded and stripped of their trousers and shoes, their arms bound with packing tape.
The provocative displays came as the increasingly ruthless pro-Russian insurgency in the east turns to kidnapping as an ominous new tactic.
Dozens of people are being held hostage, including journalists and pro-Ukraine activists, in makeshift jails in Slovyansk, the heart of the separatists' territory, as the pro-Russian insurgents strengthen their control in defiance of the interim government in Kiev and its Western supporters.
Speaking in deliberate and clipped phrases, Colonel Axel Schneider of Germany, speaking on behalf of the observers, insisted they were not NATO spies, as claimed by the insurgents, but a military observation mission operating under the auspices of the Organisation of Security and Cooperation in Europe.
'We are not fighters, we are diplomats in uniform,' he said, noting that his unarmed team included an officer from Sweden, which is not a NATO member.
The observers appeared nervous as they were escorted by the masked armed men into the Slovyansk city hall for the news conference.
Referring to himself and his team as 'guests' under the 'protection' of the city's self-proclaimed mayor, Schneider said they were being treated as well as possible under the circumstances.
'The mayor of this city granted us his protection and he regarded us as his guests,' Schneider told journalists. 'I can tell you that the word of the mayor is a word of honour. We have not been touched.'
Schneider said his group, which was detained by pro-Russian militiamen outside Slovyansk on Friday, was initially kept in a basement before being moved onSaturday.
'Since yesterday, we have been in a more comfortable room, which has been equipped with heating. We have daylight and an air conditioning unit,' he said, 'All our officers, including the interpreters, are healthy and well.'
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier condemned it as 'revolting' and a violation of the men's dignity. Four members of the team are German.
One of the observers, Swedish officer Major Thomas Johansson, was released later in the day 'on humanitarian grounds as he has a mild form of diabetes,' said Stella Khorosheva, a spokeswoman for the Slovyansk mayor. The officer got into a car with OSCE representatives outside city hall and drove off with them.
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