Because there's nothing going on in political news

The coalition talks are still going on at about the pace they were last week. This article in Zerkalo Nedeli, goes into all the mucky business in great detail. It's highly informative, but rather short on predictions. Another great articleis this one, criticizing NU for trying to weasel out of making Tymoshenko Prime Minister by selectively using Germany as an example.  (hat tip to Foreign Notes, which has already posted both these links; they've been postings some excellent coverage in this post-election period and I suggest reading their entry on Yushchenko's declining popularity)

The Back-And-Forth

As of last week, the bickering continued, with NU and Yushchenko repeating their pathetically obvious attempts to lure Tymoshenko and her bloc into joining a coalition before she locks in the PM position. The electorate's wishes are clear, they'd like to see either Yanukovych or Tymoshenko as PM, and for that reason, so would I.

Tymoshenko said resolution was near, and an agreement would be ready Monday, then repeated that she should be PM and Moroz speaker, which of course NU couldn't tolerate, so they broke off negotiations. Then yesterday Yushchenko again tried to make resolving the coalition conflict the prerequisite for, rather than the desired outcome of meeting with Tymoshenko and Moroz. About the only thing he's contributed so far is optimism (and the rather audacious notion that he considers himself kingmaker in this regard), but hopefully he will follow through and meet with the orange coalition leaders next week. On the up side, the negotiations may be over soon, if only because the 60-day deadline is coming up.

SPF Head Semeniuk - The Underminer

According to the Kyiv Post, State Property Fund head Valentyna Semeniuk (Socialist Party) has decided to fire up the rhetoric against Mittal Steel. She has always hated this business, and hated the deal that privatized Krivoryzhstal (now Mittal Kryvy Rih) into its hands. She resigned over the matter. The stance is not an aberration, she has been trying to stifle privatization for over a decade.

So it may come as no surprise to y'all that I treat her accusations of contract violation against Mittal with the deepest skepticism. Much worse than her complaint is her solution:

Semeniuk also threatened to strip the Ukrainian metallurgical plant from the hands of the investors should they fail to fulfill their obligations, adding that other companies have offered to buy the factory for more money.

“If the obligations are not fulfilled by June 6, they will face a trial on June 7,” she said.

Her retalitory measure is to strip Mittal of its holding? Does she truly believe the business will be worth more than Mittal paid (they were top bidder) once foreign buyers see Ukraine is willing to expropriate major industrial holdings on a technicality? This woman is a disgrace, a sapper undermining the support beams of the Ukrainian economy. May she be left out of whatever coalition gets formed.

The Party of Regions Was Serious about the Russian Language Issue?

Before the March election, I'd thought the issue of making Russian a second state language would disappear afterwards. But PoR continues to pursue it, at least on a local level. I'm certainly happy to see an issue of such importance to Ukrainians remain in play after the March election, but it is sad to see decisions made by fiat in local councils on the presumption (probably correct) that Yushchenko is too indecisive a leader to do anything to hinder them on the national level.

As with the NATO issue, the status of the Russian language has never been subject to national scrutiny in a way that would produce either progress or positive compromise.