KIEV, Oct. 23 - Ukraine hopes to secure an International Monetary Fund loan without raising household gas and heating prices, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said on Tuesday.

The IMF froze the $15.2 billion loan to Ukraine in early 2011 after the government had refused to hike natural gas prices for households.

KIEV, Oct. 23 – President Viktor Yanukovych said Saturday a free trade agreement Ukraine recently signed with Russia and other CIS countries was not aimed against its European integration, adding the integration will continue.

KIEV, Oct. 21 – President Viktor Yanukovych has applied his veto to the Law on Identity Documents Proving Ukrainian Citizenship, which provides for introduction of identity and Ukrainian citizenship documents containing biometric data.

KIEV, Oct. 21 – Trade between Ukraine and Russia may top $40 billion in 2008, according to participants to economic forum entitled "Ukraine – Russia: cooperation in innovation and investment sectors" underway in Kiev on Oct. 21 through Oct. 23.

KIEV, Oct. 23 - The National Bank of Ukraine has no plans to expand loan support for Prominvestbank and, instead, is pushing for the bank to bring in a strategic investor as soon as possible, the head of the National Bank, Volodymyr Stelmakh, told journalists on Wednesday.

"Its like slow death. The more we delay, the more problems will multiply," he said.

KIEV, Oct. 23 - Ukraine will take urgent measures to save the country’s steel and mining sector, which has been reducing output dramatically in reaction to falling demand worldwide, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko said Thursday.

At an emergency government meeting early Thursday, Tymoshenko appointed Vitaliy Hayduk, her top economic advisor, to lead the team that will come up with the list of measures to be approved.

KIEV, Oct. 23 – The hryvnia continued to lose value against the U.S. dollar Thursday, briefly breaching the psychological barrier of 6.0 hryvnias to the dollar, forcing the National Bank of Ukraine to intervene.

KIEV, Oct. 23 – Three economic rescue packages, prepared by Ukraine’s three main rival political groups, have been scheduled for debate in Parliament on Friday amid a growing consensus that anti-crisis measures are needed to avert recession.

KIEV, Oct. 23 – The National Bank of Ukraine should refrain from revaluing Ukraine's currency, the hryvnia, as any revaluation could increase the foreign trade deficit, Ukrsotsbank Board Chairman Borys Tymonkin has said.

KIEV, Oct. 22 – Payments to the victims of the fatal Dnipropetrovsk gas explosion which occurred Oct. 13 was on the agenda at a meeting on Monday between President Viktor Yushchenko and Russian businessman Viktor Vekselberg.