KIEV, June 10 – President Viktor Yanukovych on Monday agreed to meet leaders of opposition parties in order to diffuse a political crisis that has delayed approval of key government legislation.

The meeting was suggested by Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Rybak on Friday after the opposition groups had blocked the work of Parliament for the fourth time in seven months.

“The president has agreed to hold the meeting with the leaders of Parliamentary groups,” the presidential press service reported, adding that Yanukovych “is ready to change his weekly schedule this week, taking into account the importance of the meeting.”

The government had planned to amend its 2013 budget after the first quarter, but was forced to postpone the changes amid continuous clashes between the opposition and the ruling party in Parliament.

Now, the political crisis delays a parliamentary resolution that needs to be approved before the government starts drafting the 2014 budget, and legislation that needs to be passed for Ukraine to be able to sign political association and free trade agreements with the European Union.

Meanwhile, the leaders of the opposition groups said Yanukovych will have to agree to a range of political demands, including the release of jailed former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, for the meeting to be successful.

“Yanukovych must stop putting pressure on opposition through law enforcement system and through ‘purchasing’ lawmakers,” Arseniy Yatsteniuk, the leader of the opposition Batkivshchyna group, said.

“We are ready to change our schedule” to allow the meeting with Yanukovych this week “except that we cannot reschedule our protest rally in Mykolayiv on Thursday,” Yatseniuk said.

Yatseniuk said other key issues to be discussed with Yanukovych must include scheduling Parliamentary elections in five majority districts as well as the election of Kiev mayor.

Yanukovych was said to be considering postponing the Kiev mayor election until after the presidential election due in March 2015 in order to minimize the risk of popular resistance in Kiev, which is a stronghold of the opposition.

Yatseniuk said other issues to be discussed include economic slowdown and looming budget gap that may undermine the state finances.

“Threatening macroeconomic indicators and critical state of state finances, as well as terrible corruption must become another clause of the meeting with Yanukovych,” Yatseniuk said.

Ukraine’s economy contracted 1.3% in the first quarter from a year earlier amid weakening demand for the country’s exports, mostly steel.

The National Bank of Ukraine, seeking to boost growth, cut its key interest rate to 7% from 7.5% effective Monday, in what is the first rate cut in more than a year. (tl/ez)