The warnings in Ukraine verged on the apocalyptic when Russia sharply raised prices for natural gas a year ago. Many feared factories would close, leading to mass layoffs and grinding industry to a halt. But Ukraine's economy leaped ahead, its businesses quickly adapting to the higher costs. Now that other former Soviet republics have been hit by price hikes for Russian gas, Ukraine's experience offers them a ray of hope, analysts say — but note that Ukraine has advantages that newly hard-hit countries such as Belarus and Georgia lack...
When Ukraine Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych visited Washington in December to talk with the Bush administration about Ukraine’s economic progress, he met with Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. But Orysia Hewka, executive director of the Ukrainian Educational and Cultural Center in Jenkintown, Pa., kept her distance, even though she was invited to take part in the Washington ceremonies. She declined, she said, because she could not bring herself to meet Yanukovych...
Belarus has blocked the transit of Russian oil through its territory to European countries including Germany and Poland, news reports said Monday, raising the stakes in a bitter energy dispute between Russia and the neighboring former Soviet nation. EU energy chief Andris Piebalgs said Monday the cuts pose "no immediate risk" to energy supplies in the EU, but that he was seeking an "urgent and detailed explanation" of the cuts from authorities in Belarus and Russia...
Days after a two-tonne, seven-metre-high bronze statue of a famous Ukrainian poet was reported stolen from a park in Oakville, Ont., its head has turned up at a nearby smelter. The statue of Taras Shevchenko - a 19th-century artist and poet credited with establishing the modern Ukrainian literary language - was discovered missing on the weekend by two visitors to a 16-acre memorial park in North Oakville. Police believe it could have been stolen anytime between Dec. 15-31...
...What the Ukrainian Canadian community seeks is not compensation from today's taxpayer for past injustices. Rather, it is asking the federal government to return monies confiscated from Ukrainian and other East European immigrants during the WWI internmept operations, and which every government since has kept...
It may have taken up to two weeks for anyone to notice but police are investigating the theft of a massive bronze statue of a Ukrainian poet from a local park. Thieves likely needed help in making off with the two-tonne statue, which sat on a marble base in Shevchenko Memorial Park, said Andrew Gregorovich of the Taras Shevchenko Museum in Toronto...
Belarus and Russia's natural gas monopoly signed a five-year contract for gas supplies early Monday, just hours before Russia had threatened to cut off supplies in a price dispute. Under the agreement, Belarus will pay $100 per 1,000 cubic meters in 2007 — a reduction from the $105 that Gazprom had demanded, according to Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov...
Vladimir Putin's Orange nightmare is over. The Russian leader can now sleep soundly. Premier Viktor Yanukovych and the Party of Regions are clearly in charge in Ukraine and, in their own words, are cleaning house and restoring order...
The former interior minister, Yuriy Lutsenko, has launched a movement called the Civil Movement of Self-Defence and invites all conscientious people to join him. His initiative was prompted by, I quote, the lawlessness of the incumbent authorities...
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UKRAINE SURVIVES DESPITE GAS PRICE HIKE 
