KIEV, March 9 – Former President Viktor Yushchenko on Tuesday ended his two-week vacation and will seek to strengthen his party, Our Ukraine, ahead of likely local and national elections.

“I want to return to this political group its strength and consolidation that it had five years ago,” Yushchenko said speaking in the Cherkasy region celebrating the 196th anniversary of Taras Shevchenko, the national poet and philosopher.