The opposition is ready to unblock the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine's parliament, so as to consider the state budget for 2014, UDAR faction leader Vitali Klitschko has said.
“We’re ready to unblock the parliament to consider the budget. Let them
approve this budget and take responsibility for it,” he told reporters
after a morning meeting of parliament on Tuesday.
The leader of the Party of Regions parliamentary faction, Oleksandr
Yefremov, for his part, said that parliament would receive a tentative
version of the draft state budget for 2014 later today.
“Hopefully, today we will receive the draft that will be discussed by
the government tomorrow in order to allow us to begin working on it,”
Yefremov said at a press briefing in Kyiv on Tuesday.
If the cabinet endorses the draft budget on December 18, “we will be
able to officially debate it at the budget committee,” he said.
“We just want to speed up this process,” he said.
The macroeconomic indicators of the draft budget for the following
year will become known following Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s
negotiations with his Russian counterpart, Yefremov said.
“Since we did not sign the Association Agreement with the European
Union, and bearing in mind the fact that negotiations will be held today
and we are beginning to hope that we will receive some documents
concerning the Russian Federation, our government can make a final
decision regarding possible budget parameters in light of the gas price
setting policy and other components,” he said.
