KIEV, April 2 – Ukraine’s legislative efforts to combat its severe economic crisis is now postponed indefinitely now that the opposition Regions Party has begun blocking the work of Parliament, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko said Thursday.

“By blocking the Rada, they have in fact stopped the work on the approval of anti-crisis bills,” Tymoshenko said at a press conference. “They blocked the anti-crisis work.”

The development is a blow for Tymoshenko, who needs quick approval of the anti-crisis legislation in order to win resumption of $12.4 billion lending from the International Monetary Fund. The loan is critical for Ukraine to avert default on foreign debts this year and next, analysts said.

Diplomats representing the Group of Seven industrialized nations, along with officials from the World Bank and the IMF, on Thursday met Oleksandr Shlapak, a deputy chief of staff at the office of President Viktor Yushchenko.

The meeting underscores mounting concerns with Ukraine’s ability to conduct effective anti-crisis policy just as world leaders have been urging for coordinated actions worldwide to fight the crisis.

Ukraine’s problems are aggravated by the fact that Tymoshenko, partly due to her controversial policy steps, has failed to secure support of the majority in the 450-seat Parliament.

Parliament on Tuesday rejected three out of five anti-crisis bills whose approval was crucial for the IMF to dispatch a team to Ukraine for talks over resumption of the $12.4 billion lifeline.

Shlapak assured the diplomats that Yushchenko is committed to supporting the anti-crisis measures, and said the president will again meet political group leaders to encourage them to back the bills.

The IMF suspended lending in February after the Tymoshenko government had refused to stick to commitments, such as keeping budget deficit from widening, which had been earlier agreed with the IMF.

The Regions Party accused the Tymoshenko government for inability to act to contain the crisis, and said no comprehensive anti-crisis program had been submitted to Parliament since the crisis had unfolded in October.

“Their comments that the program has been submitted in December is profanation,” Viktor Yanukovych, a former prime minister and the leader of the Regions Party, said. “If they had the program, why they had never insisted on its debate in Parliament?”

But Tymoshenko responded by lashing out at the Regions Party, which she had accused of trying to score political points in a time when the country needs urgent anti-crisis measures to stop economic deterioration.

“This means that the Regions Party, led by Yanukovych, thinks about how to win the next election, either presidential or parliamentary, not about how to overcome the crisis and to help the people,” Tymoshenko said.

“The Regions act according to the principle of the worse the better,” Tymoshenko said. “They believe that this helps their rating to grow.” (tl/ez)