Yushchenko warns against sacking of Ukraine cabinet

UKRAINE president Viktor Yushchenko warned that the sacking of his pro-Western government by lawmakers over a controversial gas deal with Russia would destabilise the country less than three months before a key parliamentary election.

“This decision is incomprehensible and illegitimate,” Yushchenko told reporters in Kazakhstan, where he attended the inauguration of President Nursultan Nazarbayev. “This decision means only one thing: the destabilisation of the situation” in the country, he said yesterday.

Yushchenko spoke a day after lawmakers passed a resolution of no-confidence in Prime Minister Yury Yekhanurov’s government, in the wake of a deal the cabinet struck with Russia which nearly doubled gas prices. The agreement ended a stand-off that disrupted gas supplies and sent shudders through Europe which receives nearly one fifth of its annual gas imports from Russia via Ukraine.