Free Republic

Ukraine’s future is again bound up in the political ambitions of Yulia Tymoshenko. The fate of the two-time prime minister and her country are once more tightly woven together — like the blonde halo braid that made her an international icon. Only this time, Ukraine is at war, and that means Tymoshenko’s third run for president could have implications far beyond her country’s borders, potentially rewriting relations between Russia and the West and unbalancing the geopolitical order.

Boxer-turned-politician Vitali Klitschko on Saturday pulled out of the race for Ukraine's president, throwing his weight instead behind a billionaire businessman.....Klitschko's withdrawal from the presidential race would set up a battle between confectionary businessman Poroshenko and Ukraine's former prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, in the May 25 elections. After more than two years in prison, Tymoshenko was released in February following Yanukovych's ouster, her archrival.

Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has said she plans to run for president of Ukraine in May elections. Ms Tymoshenko was released from prison in February after three years in jail following the toppling of President Viktor Yanukovych. She has already served twice as prime minister and ran for president in 2010. She was a major figure in the 2004 "Orange Revolution" that ousted Mr Yanukovych from the presidency after an election widely seen as fraudulent. 'Direct action' Ms Tymoshenko said she would stand as "a candidate for Ukrainian unity". She told reporters that she had earned the right to...

<p>While the NSA is busy justifying its spying of every American its existence thanks to famous Moscow resident Edward Snowden, its Russian counterparts have been busy intercepting even more phone Ukrainian conversations.</p> <p>After a month ago a leaked phone call between US assistant secretary of state Victoria Nuland and the US envoy to the Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt confirmed that it was the US that was pulling the strings in what was about to be a violent coup overthrowing Ukraine's president Yanukovich, "someone" has just leaked another phone conversation, this time between parliamentarian Nestor Shufrych and former PM and ideological leader of the Ukraine "revolution" Yulia Tymoshenko and most probable future president of West Ukraine, in which Tymoshenko is makes the following threats, "It’s going too far! Bugger! We must grab arms and go whack those damn katsaps [a Ukrainian word used to refer to the Russians in a negative tone] together with their leader", "I’ll use all my connections, I’ll raise the whole world – as soon as I’m able to – in order to make sure.. Bugger!.. not even scorched earth won’t remain where Russia stands" although all her empty threats collapse in the last sentence of the phone conversation in which she says, regarding the Crimea annexation, that "we are going to take it to the Hague International Criminal Court." Good luck with that.</p>

Parliament arranged the release of Yanukovych's arch-rival, former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who was on her way to Kiev to join the protesters. Asked by crowds gathered at the hospital where she was released about her further plans, Tymoshenko said, "I will run for president," news agencies reported. She said she will "make it so that no drop of blood that was spilled will be forgotten." Tymoshenko, the blond-braided icon of Ukraine's 2004 Orange Revolution, was heading from prison in the eastern city of Kharkiv straight to the protest camp, her party said.

Parliament voted to free ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko from prison by decriminalizing the article in the criminal procedural code under which she was convicted. A constitutional majority of 310 lawmakers from a cross-section of different parties, including the Communists, voted for the measure. This makes the legislation veto-proof, preventing President Viktor Yanukovych from blocking the move. Yanukovych is widely blamed for ordering the imprisonment of his political rival. The bill that parliament passed included other articles of the criminal procedural code that were decriminalized. Batkivshchyna Party lawmaker Oleksandr Turchynov, a close ally of Tymoshenko and her former deputy prime minister,...