Ukraine’s president pledged a new course after protesters criticized his signing of a bill to strip anticorruption agencies of power.

Thousands of people gathered in the capital and other cities across Ukraine on Tuesday evening to urge President Volodymyr Zelensky to veto the controversial bill.

KYIV - Ukrainian officials scrambled to respond Wednesday to the eruption of mass protests as well as alarm among its European allies after President Volodymyr Zelensky signed legislation that many fear will neutralize the country’s main anti-corruption bodies and roll back reforms introduced after a pro-Western revolution more than 10 years ago.