Thursday, 25 December 2008
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko plans to declare a state of emergency in the country and cancel all elections, the country's prime minister said on Wednesday.
"The president's aim is not only to benefit at the cost of Ukraine's grief and with the backing of his supporters, but to also declare the country bankrupt, to make the country's economy absolutely unworkable and to use this base to continue his bungling rule and to introduce a state of emergency and cancel elections...," Yulia Tymoshenko said.
"I want to stop this process," she added.
Tymoshenko also urged the president, who she said had completely lost the esteem of a head of state, to volunteer to resign.
"If he [Yushchenko] has retained a grain of conscience, he must resign," the prime minister told the press.
Earlier on Wednesday Tymoshenko accused Yuschenko of scheming with the hryvnia exchange rate. The national currency in Ukraine, which was badly hit by the ongoing global financial crisis, has lost almost half its value since late September.
The media said Tymoshenko was seeking Yushchenko's impeachment.
Viktor Yanukovych, the former premier and the current leader of the opposition Party of Regions, told a meeting of the opposition government both Tymoshenko and Yushchenko should resign later this year.
"Ahead of the New Year I would like to wish that everything bad were left behind in the outgoing year. I believe this government should also be left," Yanukovych said. "Both the government and the president should resign."
