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Ukraine to Take Offensive Against Protest, Says President
Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma said Tuesday that his country would use "all legal means" to fight off the current political unrest, Ukrainian Interfax news agency reported.
The measures are to protect the interests of the people, society and nation, Kuchma said in a joint statement issued together with Prime Minister Viktor Yushenko and parliamentary speaker Ivan Plyush.
The demonstrations "represent a veritable threat to Ukraine's national security," and the government "will use all legal means to put down such actions," the statement warned.
The leaders expressed their "determination to resist destructive forces ... that show all the signs of psychological warfare."
They also pointed out that it is unnecessary to be too serious about the current situation and the negligible abnormality will soon disappear, said the statement.
The statement concluded that the door for talks with the Ukrainian leadership is always open, but it is only for those who really want the dialogues and regard them as the sole correct way for settlement of confrontation and stabilization of domestic situation.
The protests, which have brought thousands into the streets in recent days, were sparked by claims that Kuchma was involved in the missing of journalist Georgy Gongadze last September.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian authorities Tuesday arrested former Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko on charges of smuggling, forgery and large-scale tax evasion.
Timoshenko, 40, is accused of importing nearly 3 billion cubic meters of Russian gas in 1996 using forged documents and hiding hundreds of millions of dollars in profits.
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