Blue-Pink Coalition Reiterates Yanukovich Nomination.

The Regions, Socialist and Communist parties today repeated the formal formation of a coalition and repeated their nomination of Regions leader Viktor Yanukovich as prime minister. The step responded to President Yushchenko’s position that the new coalition didn’t legally exist because the Socialists hadn’t given the other members of the old Orange coalition ten days notice before quitting, as required in the parliament’s rules of order. One of Our Ukraine’s leaders, Anatoly Kinakh, welcomed the move and said the party accepted it was now in opposition. Yulia Tymoshenko called on Our Ukraine to join her bloc in resigning en masse from parliament in an effort to force its dissolution. However, both the Tymoshenko bloc and Our Ukraine said they would take part in the distribution of committee chairmanships. Attempts by Pora activists to block entry to parliament were foiled by police and Regions activists. Tom Warner: The ball is now on Yushchenko’s side of the court, and we should get some signal soon whether he will now back down and accept Yanukovich’s nomination. Yushchenko’s chief of staff, Oleh Rybachuk, gave a tough-talking interview over the weekend, published today in the newspaper Delo, in which he said firmly that Yushchenko would not accept Yanukovich’s nomination, but we suspect the interview is already out of date. Tymoshenko obviously doubts that Yushchenko will dismiss parliament or she wouldn’t be proposing such a desperate tactic as mass resignation.