KIEV, Dec. 4 – Ukraine’s two most popular opposition groups on Sunday joined forces in leading a massive protest rally in Kiev demanding the resignation of President Viktor Yanukovych and pledging cooperation at the upcoming parliamentary election.

The groups, including the Front for Changes, led by former Parliament Arseniy Yatseniuk, and Batkivshchyna, whose leader Yulia Tymoshenko is currently in jail, commanded the rally of 4,000 protesters.

“The current government has seized to be the power. Forget about saying ‘the power’ in respect to Yanukovych, [Prime Minister Mykola] Azarov and the Regions Party,” Yatseniuk said at the rally. “The power comes from God, but these are the regime.”

This is the first show of force by the two opposition groups, which had jointly supported an election bill last month that will govern parliamentary election in October 2012.

Batkivshchyna and the Front for Changes pledged to cooperate at the upcoming election by nominating single opposition candidates against pro-government candidates at each of 225 election districts throughout Ukraine.

“Our task is the parliamentary election campaign,” Yatseniuk said. “The fact that our political partners are on stage with us today shows that we’re together. The opposition has made conclusions. We will come as a single front through the election districts.”

“This is going to be the battle,” Yatseniuk said. “We will have losses, we will victories.”

“Ukraine is rising and this is confirmed by the fact that we are standing here today,” Oleksandr Turchynov, the No. 2 at the Batkivshchyna party, said at the rally.

“The only thing that we can put in response to this regime is our unity,” Turchynov said. “We begin to coordinate our actions. We have to go together and to win together.”

The protesters approved resolution demanding the resignation of Yanukovych, and the leaders of the protest have left the resolution at the front door of the presidential administration.

The rally underscores an increased cooperation between Batkivshchyna and the Front of Changes in coordinating protests, but shows that other, smaller opposition groups have yet refused to join the campaign.

The smaller opposition groups criticized Batkivshchyna and the Front for Changes for supporting the election bill last month that had increased the threshold for entering parliament on party list vote to 5% from 3%.

The bill is expected to hurt the smaller opposition parties, and may force to seek alliances with bigger groups, such as the Front for Changes and Batkivshchyna.

Vitaliy Klichko, a Ukrainian world heavyweight boxing champion whose party UDAR has been growing in popularity over the past 12 months, accused the Front for Changes and Batkivshchyna of “collusion” while approving the bill. (tl/ez)