Ukraine will sign an association agreement including a deep and comprehensive free trade area with the European Union in 2012, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has said.
"This year we will conclude the association agreement and the agreement on the free trade area," the president said at a solemn meeting in the Ukraine National Palace on the occasion of the Day of Unity and Day of Freedom of Ukraine.
The Day of Unity of Ukraine has been celebrated since 1999 by the presidential decree to mark the political and historical significance of the unification of the Ukrainian People’s Republic and the West Ukrainian People’s Republic in 1919 with the aim of creating a single Ukrainian state.
On Dec. 30, 2011 President Yanukovych signed a decree on the marking of some memorable dates and professional holidays in Ukraine, according to which Day of Unity and Freedom of Ukraine is marked on Jan. 22.
On Jan. 22, 1919 the Unification Act was signed between the Ukrainian People’s Republic and the West Ukrainian People’s Republic on Sofiyska Square in Kyiv. According to the Act, the West Ukrainian People’s Republic joined the Ukrainian People’s Republic. But due to a difficult international and internal situation the Ukrainian republics did not actually unite, and their administrations acted independently. Ukraine marked Unification Day for the first time on Jan. 22, 1990, when people united into kilometers-long living chains between Ukrainian cities.
