You're reading: Batkivschyna will collect signatures in support of NATO entry referendum despite CEC’s ban

Yulia Tymoshenko has announced that her party will launch a campaign to collect signatures in support of a referendum on Ukraine's possible accession to NATO in defiance of the Central Election Commission's (CEC) refusal to hold such a referendum simultaneously with the country's snap parliamentary election on October 26.

‘The illegal decisions of the CEC will not stop us,’ Tymoshenko said after the commission’s session on Monday.

On Tuesday, Batkivschyna will submit to the Verkhovna Rada a lustration bill targeting CEC members who banned this referendum, she said.

Furthermore, parliamentarians will lodge a complaint with the Prosecutor General’s Office, accusing ‘CEC Chairman Mykhailo Okhendovsky of committing a crime’ by prohibiting a CEC member’s participation in meetings of the NATO membership referendum action group.

Tymoshenko was also quoted as saying by the Batkivschyna press service that Ukraine’s entry into this collective security and defense system would be the most effective way to protect the country’s population from any military aggression.