Thursday, February 26, 2009

President takes heavy flak

Yesterday, in a TV appearance, former president Leonid Kravchuk called upon president Yushchenko, in no uncertain terms, to resign in a 'humane scenario'. More on this in English, here:

The president's response, on his official site, here

Some in PoR are goading BYuT into collecting signatures in parliament to start impeachment proceedings against the president, even though Kravchuk himself is against such a move. First vice-speaker of parliament Oleksandr Lavrynovych admits VR deputies could undertake such proceedings before any fresh presidential elections take place next winter.

And there are stories circulating [e.g. in 'Segodnya'] that National Security and Defence Council Secretary, formerly one of PoR's most senior leaders, Raisa Bohatyryova, may soon be sacked from her job.

She has, apparently, not been active enough in 'fighting Tymoshenko', and could be replaced by Valeriy Khoroshkovsky, who is rumoured to be close to our old friend Dmytro Firtash..

'Segodnya' [owned by Rinat Akhmetov] claims the Bohatyryova is 'traditionally' considered to have good connections with Donetsk business circles, whilst Firtash is the PM's enemy #1. And relations between YuVT and these business circles have 'warmed' recently.

p.s. Today's 'Segodnya' reports that 23% of Ukrainians wish to see their country and Russia unite to form one state, whilst only 14% of Russians have analagous feelings...interesting..

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