KIEV, April 10 ??“ Five judges of the Constitutional Court on Tuesday asked for protection after reporting mounting pressure from undisclosed political groups in the case that may have ended sharp political crisis in Ukraine.

Hours later, the court postponed for a week - until April 17 ??“ its hearing on whether President Viktor Yushchenko??™s April 2 decree dismissing Parliament complies with the constitution.

The developments raise fears that the court may fail to provide a fair and balanced review of the case and thus may issue a ruling that may provoke even a sharper stand-off.

???This all shows that a very complicated political situation is being created around the Constitutional Court,??? Yushchenko said. ???This increases expectations among the people and political parties that the ruling may be viewed as one-sided.???

The judges, including Volodymyr Kampo, Dmytro Lylak, Viktor Shishkin, Yaroslava Machuzhak and Petro Stetsiuk, are thought to be loyal to Yushchenko. This suggests the pressure may have been provided by parties or people linked with the pro-government coalition, which seeks to cancel the presidential decree.

"Public threats against judges on the constitutional court (and) the pressure on them from certain political forces to intimidate them and to politicize their activity... does not allow legitimate ruling to be reached," the judges said in a statement.

Ukraine??™s security service, SBU, on Tuesday provided bodyguards to the five judges and started its own inquiry into the allegations of the pressure.

The pressure complains come days after Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych has reported that Ivan Dombrovskiy, the chairman of the Constitutional Court, had submitted his resignation.

Ironically, Yanukovych made the statement even before Dombrovskiy??™s resignation letter had actually reached the court.

The resignation was later rejected by a panel of Constitutional Court judges, and Yanukovych??™s Regions Party had announced the developments even before the court had issued an official press release. This all suggests the Regions Party has been closely working with the judges during their deliberations of the case.

Yushchenko??™s Our Ukraine party said it had evidence that Yanukovych has been pressing for the resignation of Dombrovskiy. The Regions Party later denied the allegations and threatened to sue Our Ukraine.

The court has 18 judges, of which six are appointed by the president, six by Parliament and six by a panel of judges in Ukraine. Some of the judges on a presidential quota have been appointed by then President Leonid Kuchma and they are thought to be loyal to Yanukovych, according to analysts.

Politicians have been looking at the Constitutional Court for the ruling that would ease sharp political crisis that had been triggered by the standoff between the pro-Western president and the pro-Russian government.

Yushchenko dismissed Parliament on April 2 after the government started to massively recruit individual opposition lawmakers to boost the pro-government coalition.

Yanukovych pledged to boost the coalition from 238 seats to 300 in the 450-seat Parliament by May 1, the majority that would be able to unilaterally change the constitution disregarding results of the general election on March 26, 2006. (tl/ez)