KIEV, June 2 – President Viktor Yushchenko said Tuesday he will use all options at his disposal to stop controversial constitutional amendments that call for electing the next president in Parliament, scrapping a popular vote.

The amendments are thought to be in the center of coalition talks between Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and opposition leader Viktor Yanukovych that may reshape Ukraine’s political landscape for decades.

“There are options and all of them will be deployed,” Yushchenko said in an interview with the Unian news agency.

Neither Tymoshenko nor Yanukovych have publicly admitted the talks are underway.

But some of their closest allies on Monday have started aggressive campaign in the media defending the amendments, suggesting Tymoshenko and Yanukovych may have been close to the agreement.

Yushchenko said he would accept the Tymoshenko-Yanukovych coalition that would tackle economic crisis. But the plans to change the way the next president is elected – only months before the election is due – is an indication of Tymoshenko’s and Yanukovych’s weakness.

“Month after month the election has been becoming ever scarier. That’s why they need to make manipulations to be able to represent the supreme power in Ukraine without the election,” Yushchenko said. “This is exactly what they have been working on.”

Ukrainian voters have been strongly opposing the idea of electing the president in Parliament, suggesting an attempt to do so may backfire politically against Yanukovych and Tymoshenko.

At least 80.6% of people strongly oppose the idea, while only 6.1% support it, according to a recent opinion poll by Sofia, a Kiev-based polling agency.

The amendments also seek to extend duties of current lawmakers by at least two years – through 2015 - suggesting there will be no general elections in the meantime.

They will also seek to effectively introduce a two-party system in Ukraine by letting only the first two most popular groups enter Parliament, while cutting off all others from future legislature. There are currently five parties in Parliament.

Analysts said that Yuhchenko would be technically able to stop the amendments by announcing his immediate resignation, which would trigger a 90-day countdown for the next election. This would make it impossible for lawmakers to approve the amendments.

But Yushchenko’s opponents on Tuesday said the move would not be able to stop the amendments.

“If the president wants to resign - no problem,” Oleksandr Turchynov, the first deputy prime minister and one of Tymoshenko’s closest allies, said Tuesday.

Yushchenko said last week that he would call a referendum immediately after Tymoshenko and Yanukovych try to amend the constitution to enable the election of the next president in Parliament.

At the referendum, Yushchenko may seek the people’s approval for his own constitutional amendments, which are currently being studied by a team of European legal experts.

But at the same time, Yushchenko was skeptical that the dismissal of Parliament would be an adequate solution to the problem. “It will not be adequate,” he said. (tl/ez)