Published in Xinhua/Kyiv Post

Although Ukraine's gross domestic product (GDP) suffered a decline in 2009 compared with the previous year, the country's economy has touched the bottom and began bouncing back, Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko said on Tuesday while summing up the government's main achievements in 2009.

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Experts say that the Yulia Tymoshenko government has managed to keep the socio-economic situation at bay and on a stable level despite the financial crisis.

"Analysis of the anti-crisis policy of Ukraine demonstrates that government has during the year made decisions and succeeded with anti-crisis measures, which overall were logical and directed at anti-crisis actions in our country," the director of the Institute for Economic Research and Policy Consulting, Ihor Burakovsky, said during a roundtable discussion in Kyiv on "Socio-Economic Results of 2009."

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According to the former head of a department of the Presidential Secretariat Yaroslav Kozachok, President Viktor Yushchenko and Party of Regions Leader Viktor Yanukovych have signed a confidential agreement on cooperation during the presidential election campaign.

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Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has wished Christians of the Western Rite a Merry Christmas and wished that Jesus bless Ukraine and bring confidence in a better future.

"I wish all believers of Ukraine who celebrate Christmas according to the Western Rite, happiness and love."

According to Yulia Tymoshenko, this holiday "for more than two thousand years has been giving people hope for eternal life and the victory of good over evil."

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Today’s launch of the first unit at the Dnister Hydroelectric Power Plant is a major step in the implementation of Ukraine’s energy strategy for the period through 2030.

"The government’s policy is aimed at making this energy strategy a reality," Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko said during a working visit to the Chernivtsi oblast.

According to the Prime Minister, one important element of this strategy is renewable sources of energy, which includes hydroelectric power.

Yulia Tymoshenko also added that the government will do everything possible to reduce consumption of natural gas and coal and cut carbon emissions, “and to ensure that our energy is optimal in price, and that we are competitive in the world markets."

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BYuT wants to hold an extraordinary session of parliament immediately after the New Year to adopt the State Budget for 2010.

"If parliament repeals the corresponding decision to return the budget to the Cabinet of Ministers, the 1300 amendments already approved by the budget committee in the draft law on the State Budget for 2010 will be forwarded to the government. The government will take them into account or not, and present a draft budget in the session hall to review in a second reading. Clearly, we will then need to convene an extraordinary session at any time, and I think, right after the New Year....To vote for the budget in the current edition," said BYuT deputy Serhiy Sobolev.

On November 20, the Verkhovna Rada adopted the resolution "On sending for revision the draft Law ‘On the State Budget for 2010."

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Vice Prime Minister Hryhoriy Nemyria, Acting Finance Minister Ihor Umansky and Deputy Finance Minister Anatoliy Miarkovsky have left for Washington to hold the next round of talks with the IMF.

The obligations of the Ukrainian side as outlined in the letter of intent and memorandum on economic and financial policies signed in July of this year as part of the stand-by program with the IMF are still valid.

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Relations between Ukraine and the International Monetary Fund concerning the stand-by loan remain valid in terms of Ukraine’s obligations corresponding to a letter of intent and Memorandum of Economic and Financial Policy, signed in July of this year.

The positions of both sides in examining the stand-by loan’s conditions and budget policy of the Cabinet of Ministers for 2009-2010 are being discussed today in Washington D.C. where Ukraine’s delegation is located.

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Published in Inform issue #134
See the full issue here.

Last week Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko attended the Statutory Congress of the European People’s Party (EPP) in Bonn, Germany, hosted by Chancellor Angela Merkel. While the leaders of Europe’s largest political party will not endorse any single presidential candidate in the first round of Ukraine’s forthcoming elections, the congress attendees left with the clear and unmistakable impression that the EPP saw Ms Tymoshenko as its preferred democratic candidate.

The message was simple. The EPP’s leaders called upon Ukraine's democratic forces to unite around the most democratic candidate to reach the presidential run-off. Opinion polls and experts concur that this will be Ms Tymoshenko, who will face the Party of Regions leader Viktor Yanukovych in a second round contest.

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Published in Financial Times
By Stefan Wagstyl and Roman Olearchyk

Ukraine has made an urgent appeal to the International Monetary Fund for about $2bn in emergency loans to ease “an extremely difficult situation” in meeting its external obligations and avoid the danger of a “spill-over effect” on other economically vulnerable states.

“The next three months are crucial,” Hryhoriy Nemyria, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, told the Financial Times one day after returning from a mission to the IMF’s headquarters in Washington.

Read the full article at FT.com