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Rickety ballot: carpenters build voting booths in Slaviansk ahead of Sunday's proposed referendum on self-rule. Photo: Getty Images

Mariupol: Ukraine's interim President Oleksander Turchynov warned pro-Russian eastern regions they would be stepping into the abyss if they voted for self-rule on Sunday in a referendum that has raised Western fears of a slide into full civil war.

Barricades of tyres and scrap metal blocked streets in the port city of Mariupol and in Slaviansk, centres of an uprising that has unleashed the worst crisis between the West and Russia since the Cold War.

For a vote on which so much hangs, the referendum in the regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, which has declared itself a "People's Republic", seems a decidedly ad hoc affair.

Deadly clashes: a woman looks at a burned Ukrainian government tank on Saturday after fighting in the city of Mariupol. Photo: Getty Images

Ballot papers have been printed with no security provision and the meaning of the question - asking voters if they support state 'self-rule' for the People's Republic of Donetsk - is, perhaps deliberately, unclear.

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The eastern uprising followed the toppling in February of Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, whose pursuit of ties with Moscow stirred mass protests by pro-Western activists in Kiev.

Ukrainian forces have been striking back with shows of force especially in Mariupol, an important industrial and shipping centre. The interior ministry said 20 rebels were killed in fighting there on Friday, while hospitals put the number of dead at seven.

Russia denies Western and Ukrainian accusations it has fostered the rebellion. It portrays the Kiev government as hostage to violent anti-Russian nationalists, intent on rooting out the culture and language of the Russian-speaking east.

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Ukraine warns of 'abyss' as rebel east approaches self-rule vote