KIEV, March 29 – Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn on Monday criticized calls for Ukraine to join the union with Russia and Belarus, adding the government must work to strengthen the country’s independence.

KIEV, March 29 – President Viktor Yanukovych has set the task to improve the quality of motor roads in the country to enable travelers cross Ukraine from west to east in 13 or 14 hours.

KIEV, March 29 – Antonov, Ukraine’s aircraft manufacturer, presented two small promising aircraft to potential partners in Latin America at an Air & Space Show in Santiago, Chile, the company reported.

KIEV, March 26 – Integration with the European Union is a priority for the Ukrainian government, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said at a meeting with a delegation of visiting MEPs headed by Adrian Severin, the vice-president of the Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament.

KIEV, March 26 – Europe has not yet simplified the visa regime for Ukraine, and this requires Kiev to defend the interests of Ukrainians, particularly through the possible restoration of the visa regime for EU citizens, Presidential Secretariat Chairman Viktor Baloha said.

MOSCOW, March 26 - Standard & Poor's Ratings Services has assigned its 'CCC+' long-term local currency debt rating and its 'uaBB' Ukraine national scale rating to a proposed UAH300 million (about $39 million) senior unsecured bond to be issued by the Ukrainian city of Lviv (CCC+/Negative/--; Ukraine national scale 'uaBB'), the agency said in a press release.

KIEV, March 27 – Japan is considering the possible allocation of a $5 billion loan to Ukraine, according to Ukrainian Economy Minister Bohdan Danylyshyn.

KIEV, March 29 – The European Union should start buying Russian natural gas at the border between Ukraine and Russia, President Viktor Yushchenko said on Sunday, defending a recent EU-Ukraine gas declaration that angered Moscow.

KIEV, March 29 – The opposition Regions Party on Friday failed to deliver on its promise to organize massive street protests throughout Ukraine, but pledged its lawmakers would go ahead and block Parliament’s work if the government takes no action to ease the country’s economic crisis.

KIEV, March 29 ??“ President Viktor Yushchenko on Thursday criticized the government of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych for its failure to sell major locomotive maker at open and competitive tender.

Luhanskteplovoz, the only producer of electric locomotives in the former Soviet Union, was sold for 292 million hryvnias, compared with about 2 billion hryvnias that the government could raise.