KIEV, Dec. 15 – The Prosecutor General’s Office on Wednesday opened a criminal investigation against opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko, effectively restricting her ability to travel ahead of her planned visit to Brussels.

KIEV, Dec. 15 – UEFA inspectors will again check the state of preparations of facilities in Ukraine for hosting the Euro 2012 European Football Championship, Euro 2012 Director Martin Kallen said.

"The next visit [by UEFA inspectors] will take place in March, when we'll thoroughly look what has been done.

KIEV, Dec. 15 - President Viktor Yushchenko by his decree authorized Energy and Fuel Minister Yuriy Prodan to sign later this month the European Energy Community treaty, the presidential press service reported Tuesday.

MOSCOW, Dec. 15 – The head of Russian energy giant Gazprom on Tuesday said he expected no problems with Ukraine paying next month for natural gas imported in December.

KIEV, Dec. 15 – The International Monetary Fund has convinced the National Bank of Ukraine of the need to cancel the ban on the early withdrawal of deposits in the near future, said Ceyla Pazarbasioglu, the head of the IMF Mission to Ukraine.

KIEV, Dec. 15 – The pace of annual real GDP growth in 2008 will slow to 3.5%-4% compared to a 5.8% rise over the first 10 months of 2008, Economy Minister Bohdan Danylyshyn told Dzerkalo Tyzhnia newspaper.

The minister said that the slow will be due to the production fall through constriction of the foreign markets and the decline in domestic demand due to the limited access to credits, the freezing of own companies' funds in stocks of ready-made products and payments on credits without a possibility to refinance them.

KIEV, Dec. 15 – President Viktor Yushchenko’s Our Ukraine party on Monday failed to secure enough votes from its lawmakers to create a coalition with Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s group, suggesting the differences between the two have been widening.

Our Ukraine-People’s Self-defense, which controls 72 seats in the 450-seat Parliament, needs to secure support of at least 37 lawmakers, a simply majority, to be able to approve the coalition.

KIEV, Dec. 15 – The hryvnia plummeted 8% against the U.S. dollar on Monday amid concerns Ukraine’s financial crisis may be worse than government forecasts and the country’s forex reserves may vanish before the end of 2009.

KIEV, Dec. 15 ??“ Ukraine, which is involved in an severe natural gas dispute with Russia, entered potentially even more difficult talks over gas prices with Turkmenistan, an official said Thursday.

KIEV, Dec. 15 ??“ European customers may face natural gas supply disruptions next year if Russian gas giant Gazprom moves to unilaterally cancel its gas transit agreement with Ukraine, officials warned