Ukrainian President Viktor Yush-chenko was faced with a tough new political rival yesterday after sacked prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko broke with the "orange revolution" leader ahead of a key election.
Tymoshenko's announcement that she would participate in upcoming parliamentary elections separately from Yushchenko following her dismissal broke apart the "orange revolution" dream team that assumed power less than a year ago.
It also dealt a major blow to the Ukrainian leader ahead of a crucial parliamentary vote next March.
PHOTO: AP
"Today we are definitely two different teams and these two teams will go their separate ways," the charismatic Tymoshenko said on a live television talk show late on Friday, a day after Yushchenko sacked her government.
Ukraine's upcoming legislative election will redraw the nation's political landscape and Yushchenko needs to score a decisive win in order to continue the pro-Western course that he has set for the ex-Soviet nation.
Now the Ukrainian president and his allies will face the poll with a powerful new rival. The 44-year-old petite and pretty "Lady Yu" is known for her iron will and, as one analyst put it, "is most effective when in opposition."
She also enjoys widespread popular support -- during the "orange revolution" her speeches fired up the crowds and roaring chants of "Yulia!" were heard alongside those of "Yu-shchen-ko!"
Although Tymoshenko said there would be no "war" between her and Yushchenko during the parliamentary election campaign, the rest of her statement seemed to point otherwise.
She accused the president's close circle of scheming to get her fired ever since her appointment as head of government in early February and charged that several close presidential advisors were guilty of corruption.
She said she had "forgiven" Yushchenko, but did little to hide her bitterness with the Ukrainian president.
"With his decision he ... destroyed our unity ... our future and the future of the country," she said.
Tymoshenko heads a block in the Ukrainian parliament that currently has 40 seats in the 450-member Upper Rada.
"I am counting that during the elections, in which we will participate absolutely separately, our political force will achieve a worthy result in order to continue to set the nation's policies," she said.
Yushchenko sacked his Cabinet on Thursday in a bid to quash a deepening corruption scandal sparked by a simmering battle for power between Tymoshenko and the powerful former chief of the National Security Council, Petro Poroshenko.
He named a trusted ally, Yury Yekhanurov, as acting premier. The 57-year-old liberal economist has been huddling with political party leaders and outgoing ministers in talks on forming a new government.
Yushchenko has pledged that the new government will continue with the reform policies that he set out at his inauguration in January, assuring European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso in a phone conversation on Friday that the pro-Western course would stay on track.
The appointment of Yekhanurov, a long-time Yushchenko ally with extensive experience in the executive branch who is not known for harboring political ambitions, was welcomed across Ukraine's political spectrum and by investors.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS