KIEV, Feb. 2 - President Viktor Yanukovych moved on Wednesday to calm a damaging situation with Ukraine’s soccer ruling body which is threatening the country's right to co-host the 2012 European Championship.

Yanukovych denied that the state had been interfering in the Ukrainian Football Federation (FFU), called for sensitive internal discussions to be postponed until after the tournament and said he did not want Ukraine to lose the right to organize Euro 2012.

"We can resolve the conflict in the FFU by postponing discussions on its internal problems until next year," he said, quoted by Reuters in an interview ahead of a planned visit to Warsaw on Thursday.

Ukraine is co-hosting Euro 2012 with Poland.

European soccer's governing body UEFA has given Ukraine until Feb. 4 to end pressure on the president of its national federation or face suspension from international football, thus losing the right to stage the tournament next June.

UEFA has come down on the side of Hryhoriy Surkis, who has headed the FFU for 10 years and is now fighting a sustained attempt by opponents to oust him before Euro 2012.

Ukraine's big-money soccer scene is rife with competing interests among its super-wealthy.

Ukrainian media say key figures who want the 61-year-old Surkis out include Euro 2012 minister Boris Kolesnikov and chemical and construction oligarch Oleksandr Yaroslavskiy, Reuters reported.

Soccer insiders in Ukraine say it is likely that Yanukovych's veiled warning to them to back down would carry weight when they considered a response to UEFA.

Last Friday, UEFA gave Ukraine a week to resolve the situation after receiving documents showing that some state and regional authorities were putting pressure on delegates.

Surkis's opponents, who have a majority voice in the FFU, say they will continue to seek his dismissal despite the warnings from UEFA and world soccer's governing body FIFA.

They have been seeking an extraordinary meeting of the FFU to push through a vote of no-confidence in Surkis.
Yanukovich appeared to be denying there was any direct political interference from his camp, though oligarch wealth and raw politics are fused in Ukraine.

Insiders expected a formal response to UEFA from them within the next 48 hours, Reuters reported.

Several FFU members tried unsuccessfully in December to sack Surkis who has been accused by some fans of favoring Dynamo Kiev, a team run by his brother Ihor Surkis.

Other power brokers tied closely into Ukraine's football world include its wealthiest man, Rinat Akhmetov who owns leading club Shakhtar Donetsk. He was a powerful financial backer of Yanukovych's election campaign.

Another oligarch, Ihor Kholomoyskiy, who made his fortune in banking, metals and fuel, is seen as a backer of Surkis. (rt/ez)