Ukraine, in the wake of its Orange Revolution, has earned the image of a leading post-Soviet country regarding the pace of liberal reform. However, this perception of the country is to a large extent a kind of payment in advance rather than a reflection of actual results.

If Tymoshenko wants to stay in office, she needs to patch up or enlarge the coalition before the parliament’s summer vacation or block the parliament’s work by raising debatable and provocative issues or besieging the rostrum.

Yulia Tymoshenko and Viktor Yanukovych have the highest ratings as potential candidates for the presidency. The only difference is that this past winter Tymoshenko was 1-2 percent ahead of Yanukovych and now their standings are exactly opposite.

Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine are neither an ethnic sub-community of the Russian nation nor a part of the “Russian world”.

Yushchenko is not ready to agree to an honorable post of parliamentary president yet. Tymoshenko showed her readiness to prolong his term as president without any elections under the condition of substantial reduction of his authority.

Interview with Volodymyr Ohryzko, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.

If one million “active citizens” get the right to initiate, amend, or abrogate any law and even the Constitution, then the parliament may not only lose its status of the sole legislative body...

"NATO has always taken Russia into account when considering the modalities of enlargement, the timing of it and the likely consequences of it. But it has never granted Russia a veto over this process or a role to play in it," James Sherr. 

Days before the NATO summit in Bucharest began, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili rolled out a new peace initiative for breakaway Abkhazia.

Speaking today at NATO's summit in Bucharest, Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said the alliance wants to welcome Ukraine and Georgia as members someday.

At the upcoming NATO summit in Bucharest from April 2 - 4, 2008 the quest for a new comprehensive NATO "Grand Strategty" will be one of the most sensitive issues.

It is conventionally believed that in the first hundred days a new government enjoys its highest rating of popular trust and ought to use this circumstance for reforms and innovations. In this sense the new Ukrainian leadership has simply wasted its first 100 days.

Last Friday, Yuliya Tymoshenko and Oleh Dubina, were to report to the President of Ukraine on the results of the gas talks with Gazprom.

There is an interesting and very plausible version: it is Viktor Baloha who put parliament out of operation. Allegedly, it was his idea to send the notorious letter to the NATO Secretary General.

By legalizing Gazporom in our market, we won’t have any impulse for re-equipping the power-consuming industries – we will live under the patronage of Gazprom.

Radek Sikorski has visited Kyiv for the first time since the government of Donald Tusk came to power in November.

Viktor Yushchenko is definitely set to change the Constitution and sees a national referendum as the only possible way. He means to have presidential powers increased.

President of the center for economic development on the logic of reform and the choice of means discrediting the noblest goals.

A meeting with Volodymyr Ohryzko, Foreign Minister of Ukraine, opens a series of ZN interviews with the new Cabinet members.

Ukraine's parliament on December 18 confirmed Yulia Tymoshenko as prime minister, returning the controversial pro-Western politician to power three years after the Orange Revolution catapulted her to a short-lived, divisive premiership.

It is not even the matter of her astounding charisma and the iron will – Yulia Tymoshenko managed to sense the optimal propaganda strategy capable of uniting the both banks of the Dnieper, both parts of Ukraine.

“Viktor Yushchenko always makes the right decision… after he tries all other alternatives”. It is not always true, but it is absolutely true for the process of forming today’s coalition.

It seemed that the talks about gas relations between Russia and Ukraine and between Gazprom and Naftagaz Ukraine were taking their normal course... before November 22.

Ukraine should not hesitate to say to its younger brother, Russia, that it should learn Ukrainian political culture.

Tymoshenko has learned a lesson from her recent premiership and this time, of course if she manages to enter the same river twice, she will not take thoughtless steps.

Were there more calculated motives behind Putin’s speech? I think so. First, on the eve of an extremely high profile visit to the Middle East, it was designed to mobilise those who could be impressed.

It was a good pretext for him [Lavrov] to have a close look at the processes in this country, probe into the strengths and weaknesses of the political leadership. All of this is important in the context of Vladimir Putin’s forthcoming visit to Ukraine. 

It is doubtful that Solana arrived in Kyiv with the sole purpose of receiving the award from Viktor Yushchenko: he must have had other priorities in mind, especially in the light of the upcoming informal EU energy summit in Finland.

Kyiv actually dreamed of being invited to join the NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) at the NATO foreign ministers’ meeting in Sofia, the Bulgarian capital. Yet it was not the alliance’s fault that it did not happen once again, despite numerous favorable conditions.

Ukrainian ministers continue to publicly remain optimistic about their country’s chances of NATO membership. Different dates are given for the country’s entry, from 2008-2010.

Last autumn, the Kachinski brothers - Lech and Jaroslaw - started writing a new page of Polish history as soon as the rightists won the parliamentary and presidential elections.

The chairman of the nongovernmental organization Project on Transitional Democracies, Bruce Jackson is a well-known figure in the former “countries of People’s Democracy”.

DMITRY VYDRIN

The fact that two Verkhovna Rada legislators, Igor Rybakov and Yuri Bout, have withdrawn from the democratic coalition casts doubt on its prospects.

VLADIMIR ZHARIKHIN

The main result to be drawn from the informal CIS summit is that under the new Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Russia's policy in the post-Soviet space will not change drastically.

VALERY CHALIY

It is intolerable that, according to public opinion polls in Russia, Ukraine ranks third among the unfriendly states. In Ukraine Russia ranks first as a friendly one. Probably, this indicates that the information policies in Ukraine and Russia are different.

YURY YAKIMENKO

I believe that President Yushchenko and Prime Minister Tymoshenko will prolong the truce till the autumn. If there are no political convulsions, no coalition reformating and if the early elections are not held before October-November, one can hope that relative political stability will be maintained in Ukraine for a longer time.

VITALY BALA

I would not exaggerate the importance of the Kyiv mayoral elections in terms of their influence on the political situation in the country as a whole. Though, of course, the elections were of great importance.

DMITRY VYDRIN

It seems that Prime Minister Yuliya Tymoshenko wants to be dismissed. She does not want to resign, she would like to be fired.

VITALY BALA

The President Yushchenko’s wish to push through his version of the constitutional reform played a mean trick on him. The President and his team did not expect that Prime Minister Tymoshenko would offer such resistance.  And Tymoshenko took the initiative.

ALEXEY GOLOBUTSKY

In 2004 it came as a compromise in a sense. But Constitution is not a document for compromise, for it is a state-forming document rather than a political one.

ANDREY KOKOSHIN, FIRST DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF THE STATE DUMA COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND HIGH TECHNOLOGIES; FYODOR LUKYANOV, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF OF "RUSSIA IN GLOBAL AFFAIRS" MAGAZINE

"The change consists in the fact that Russia can no longer influence the domestic policy of its neighbors. When that became clear Russia chose the pragmatic approach," Fyodor Lukyanov.

KONSTANTIN ZATULIN, ALEXANDER KONOVALOV, TATYANA PARKHALINA, OLES DONIY, LEONID KOZHARA, IVAN ZAETS, ANDREW KUCHINS

"Why do the Central and Eastern European countries seek to join NATO? For many of them it is a way to join the EU. Many countries took this as institutionalization of independence from Moscow. For many countries it was a way to return to Europe," Tatyana Parkhalina.

STEPHEN BLANK

In advance of NATO’s Bucharest summit Russia has decided to employ the traditional Soviet tactics of intimidation and blackmail to block NATO’s enlargement.

GEORGETA POURCHOT

The Bucharest NATO summit offers a significant possibility that NATO’s and Russia’s positions on a variety of issues will further diverge, marking the beginning of the end of this uneven relationship.

DMITRY VYDRIN, YEVHEN KOPATKO

"The purpose of the visit is to enlist the Ukrainian diaspora’s support in the U.S. presidential election. The diaspora is quite numerous and has always backed the Republicans. But recently the Republicans have become less popular with the American Ukrainians," Dmitry Vydrin.

VITALY BALA

“100 days” implies carte blanche for any government. A government can do almost whatever they like within that period: reshuffle the Cabinet, put forward reforms or pursue their own economic policy. In other words, a government is given a free hand.

GEORGETA POURCHOT

Eurasian Home website with a kind permission of the Greenwood Publishing Group Inc., publishes the first chapter "Sovereignity from Within" of the book "Eurasia Rising: Democracy and Independence in the Post-Soviet Space" by the Eurasian Home website contributor Georgeta Pourchot.

YURY YAKIMENKO

As regards the conflict between the President and the Prime Minister, they compete with each other for almost everything. Virtually all of important decisions or steps taken by the Cabinet evoked a reaction from the President’s Secretariat.

VADIM KARASYOV

It seems that the Russian authorities make it clear that as long as Tymoshenko is Prime Minister, Russia doesn’t want to be Ukraine’s partner.

YULIYA TISHCHENKO

The visit of Prime Minister of Ukraine, Yuliya Tymoshenko, to Moscow on February 20-21 was made against a background of deterioration of her relations with President Viktor Yushchenko.

DMITRY VYDRIN

Moscow is afraid of making Yuliya Tymoshenko a counterpart in talks on the gas relations. As a result, Viktor Yushchenko again became the major negotiator with Russia. 

VITALY BALA

Tymoshenko’s seeking to remove the RosUkrEnergo company from the the chain of the gas supplies and transit should be considered as an element of her presidential campaign. "Gas relations" with Russia became one of her weak points during her first premiership.

VADIM KARASYOV

The election of Yuliya Tymoshenko as Ukraine’s Prime Minister is the evidence of the fact that parliamentary-electoral mechanism of government formation is being created in Ukraine.

GEORGETA POURCHOT

NATO’s most recent informal summit in Sophia underscores a decade and a half of balancing act between two former adversaries, the North Atlantic Alliance and Russia.

There is an old joke in Ukraine: two Ukrainians find a bottle containing a genie who grants them each a wish. The first Ukrainian requests and gets what he wants; the second Ukrainian uses his wish to cancel the wish of his countryman. The joke is that envy to the detriment of one's own interests is part of the Ukrainian national character. Certainly this seems to be the case with the country’s politicians.

Who would think that a banal song contest like Eurovision can trigger new round of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. When Kyiv won the right to host the finals of the 50^th Eurovision contest, Moscow was sick with envy and spent millions to catch up with the Western neighbor. It cost Russia several expensive but futile attempts. And finally at Eurovision 2008 Russian pop singer Dima Bilan won the contest.

The crusade to raise the Ukrainian language heads and shoulders above Russian continues apace in Kyiv and other parts of the country, but as with most crusades, it’s not clear what the end goal is. Ukraine’s State Cinema Service recently announced that all films made in Ukraine must be in Ukrainian starting in July. All foreign films shown in Ukraine are already required to be dubbed or subtitled in Ukrainian.

Over the holiday-filled weekend, Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov arrived in the history-filled city of Sevastopol to challenge the history and geopolitical relations of Ukraine and Russia. The official purpose of Mr. Luzhkov's visit was to take part in the celebration of the 225th anniversary of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, which fell on Europe Day (May 11) and just after Victory Day (May 9).

Russian Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov led a government delegation to Kyiv on April 25. It was only a one-day visit, and Zubkov is expected to be replaced sometime this month anyway, following the inauguration of the new Russian president.

It’s no secret that Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko have not enjoyed good relations for a long time. But ever since the two politicians found themselves neck and neck in the stretch for the presidency, their simmering mutual antipathy has flared up into open hostility.

NATO leaders arrived for their summit in Bucharest last week in an atmosphere of uncertainty bordering on mistrust. Outgoing US president George Bush continued to push for the inclusion of Ukraine and Georgia into the alliance, while European heavyweights Germany and France voiced the opposition of older member states to further eastern expansion.

The presidential campaign in America is still a three-way race between Obama, Clinton and McCain. But in Ukraine, where the elections are still two years off, it’s everyone against Yulia Tymoshenko. Appearing before a government meeting on Wednesday, March 26, the fiery female politician said her opponents had already begun attempts to undermine the fragile pro-Western majority in parliament.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has made international recognition of the Holodomor his personal crusade. Good for him. The famine of 1932-1933 claimed some six to eight million Ukrainian lives - as much as a quarter of the population - and it wasn’t a natural catastrophe. Yushchenko wants the Holodomor recognized as genocide, thus putting Ukraine’s tragedy on the same level as the Jewish Holocaust.

Just into his fourth year as president of Ukraine, Viktor Yushchenko is beginning to act a lot like the man he replaced during the country's Orange Revolution. Former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma is often remembered for waffling on Western integration, crushing freedom of speech and overseeing a state apparatus steeped in corruption.

Once again, Russia has resorted to threats and bullying in an ongoing effort to keep Ukraine subservient. And once again, its weapon of choice is gas. Most colonial divorces have been characterized by the colony cutting off the colonizer from its supply of natural resources. But with Russia, the situation is exactly the opposite - at least that's the way it seems on the surface.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s long running efforts to break the stranglehold on her country’s gas supplies are beginning to pay off – due to assistance from an unlikely ally. Russia, which has been widely accused of using gas sales to put geopolitical pressure on Ukraine and other Western neighbors, now appears to be cleaning up its act.

The issue of whether Ukraine should join NATO has returned to the public agenda, sparking off heated debates between supporters and opponents of the country’s bid. In the past, such polemics have usually meant proponents of Euro-Atlantic unity coming under attack by pro-Russian factions in the run up to an important election or a NATO-sponsored military exercise on home soil.

It’s a new year, and Ukraine has a new government headed by a fiery reformer with a penchant for making high-stake gambles. Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko is known as the gas queen – more for how she earned her money back in the 1990’s than for how she has tried to clean up her country’s gas sector in more recent years. But clean it up she has tried, against highly formidable of opponents at home and abroad.

The queen of Ukrainian politics, opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko, was the unofficial victor in Ukraine’s snap elections on Sunday, with exit polls indicating she will head the next government. But Tymoshenko’s ascension to power will be anything but a sexy saunter, as her enemies are unlikely to allow themselves to be sidelined by a pretty populist.

To be or not to be a member of NATO – that is the question for Ukrainians, who still aren’t in a position to decide the issue. Public opinion polls conducted in the country continue to show that most Ukrainians are against joining the Western military alliance. But advocates of NATO membership  insist that Ukrainians have not been given an accurate picture of what the alliance is about.

I was at the first US-Ukrainian conference in Boston last week. The first speaker, a former US National Security Council wonk named John Tedstrom, was particularly excited about Ukraine’s move to join NATO, which at the moment looks more realizable than its other ambition to join the EU. NATO accession, said Tedstrom, would help anchor Ukraine in a trans-Atlantic-focused foreign policy.