A new era dawned in Ukraine on Sunday when
parliament appointed a
pro-Western
interim leader
after impeaching a defiant president Viktor Yanukovych, whose
whereabouts remain a mystery following a week of carnage. The ex-Soviet state's
bloody three-month crisis culminated in a dizzying flurry of historic changes
over the weekend that saw parliament
oust the pro-Russian Yanukovych and call a presidential election for 25th
May. Lawmakers then went a step further by approving the release from her
seven-year jail sentence of former prime
minister Yulia Tymoshenko -- a star
of the 2004 Orange Revolution who was thrown behind bars less than a year
after Yanukovych came to power in 2010.
The constitutional legitimacy of parliament's
actions remains an open question and Yanukovych vowed in a taped interview to
fight the "bandits" who now claimed to rule Ukraine. But Yanukovych's
grasp on power was in limited evidence in Kiev today as the city's police
presence vanished and protesters took control of everything from traffic
management to protection of government buildings after a week of bloodshed that
claimed nearly 100 lives. The United States vowed to drum up financial help
that could help pull Ukraine out of a crisis that erupted in November when
Yanukovych spurned an historic EU trade deal and secured a USD 15-billion
bailout for the struggling nation of 46 million people from old master Russia.
Lawmakers voted today to name close
Tymoshenko ally Oleksandr Turchynov -- himself only appointed as parliament
speaker yesterday in place of a veteran Yanukovych supporter -- as interim
president with the task of forming a new government by Tuesday.
Turchynov immediately vowed to draw up a
"government of the people" and urged leading lawmakers to create a
new parliamentary majority that could swiftly approve reforms that had stalled
under Yanukovych. "We have until Tuesday," the 49-year-old interim
leader said. New interior minister Arsen Aviakov announced the launch of a
probe into police involvement in the "execution" of protesters in a
week of carnage that turned the heart of Kiev into a war zone.
Yanukovych was dealt another embarrassing
blow when his own Regions Party issued a statement condemning him for issuing
"criminal orders" that led to so many deaths. Parliament also voted
to dimiss Ukraine's Foreign Minister Leonid Kozhara after sacking the federal
police chief and prosecutor general on Saturday.
