President sets early election date in Ukraine

UKRAINIAN president Viktor Yushchenko yesterday called early general elections after dissolving parliament when parties failed to resurrect a ruling pro-western coalition in the former Soviet state.

Yushchenko decreed to “set parliamentary elections for December 7, 2008”, said a statement on his official website, ending weeks of uncertainty about whether the coalition could patch up its differences.

The crisis has raised concerns in the west that pro-Moscow parties may come to power in the eastern European country, casting doubt on Kiev’s attempt to strengthen ties with Washington and Brussels.

Yushchenko said he would dissolve parliament in a televised speech that also included sharp words for a fellow pro-western politician, prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, a former ally turned bitter arch-rival.

“I am deeply convinced that it was human ambition that destroyed the democratic coalition — one person’s ambition, lust for power, differences in values and putting personal interests ahead of national ones,” Yushchenko said, referring to Tymoshenko.

The prime minister’s allies in turn blamed Yushchenko for the disintegration.

“We consider this act to be anti-constitutional and senseless”, said the deputy chief of the parliament faction of Tymoshenko’s party, Andrei Portnov.

“What happened today was 100% provoked by the president, who is the one standing behind the coalition’s collapse,” he said.

Yushchenko and Tymoshenko have had a love-hate relationship since 2004, when they were inseparable for the so-called Orange Revolution to overturn the rigged election of pro-Russian candidate Viktor Yanukovych as president.