Ukraine Mps Vow to Defy President After Talks Fail

Ukraine's beleaguered president, Viktor Yushchenko, yesterday faced a constitutional crisis when MPs said they would refuse to obey any order from him after tangled coalition talks collapsed, giving him the legal right to dissolve parliament.

The powerful speaker of parliament, Alexander Moroz, told Ukrainian television that MPs would disobey any order from the president to dissolve parliament. "Even assuming that an illegal decree dissolving parliament is issued, the Verkhovna Rada [parliament] would not obey," he said late on Monday night.

The crisis came after Mr Yushchenko, elected president on a wave of pro-western sentiment after the "Orange revolution" in November 2004, refused to accept parliament's nomination of his rival, Viktor Yanukovich, as prime minister.

Mr Yushchenko made no comment on the nomination, and as the deadline passed at midnight on Monday, gained the legal right to dissolve parliament and call elections. Most analysts think the Orange revolution's leader, whose popularity has collapsed after months of feckless government, is stalling and will eventually accept Mr Yanukovich as prime minister.

Mr Yanukovich, who wants to keep Ukraine in Russia's geopolitical orbit, urged Mr Yushchenko to back down. He told parliament: "We should show ... wisdom and forget about our differences. There are certain forces who are trying to provoke a civil conflict."

The standoff came after months of talks between Mr Yushchenko's Orange coalition and its rivals, the bloc led by Mr Yanukovich.

Yulia Tymoshenko, the president's Orange revolution partner turned rival, was set to become prime minister in a fragile coalition with Mr Yushchenko until a key bloc of MPs defected to Mr Yanukovich's faction. This meant the Yanukovich bloc could nominate its own prime minister for the president to accept.