Tymoshenko

Moscow is so confident that relations with Ukraine will improve after this weekend’s presidential elections that it won’t wait for an expected runoff in three weeks to fill its long-vacant ambassadorship in Kiev. Mikhail Zurabov is expecting to be dispatched to Kiev any day now.
Ties sank to new lows in August when President Dmitry Medvedev announced that he would not send the newly appointed ambassador to Ukraine while President Viktor Yushchenko remained in office; Yushchenko is almost certain to be voted out of office in the election on Sunday.

 
The following press release was issued a few days ago by NATO:
 
"NATO and Ukraine took their relationship to a higher level by the signing of a “Declaration to Complement the Charter on a Distinctive Partnership between NATO and Ukraine” at NATO Headquarters on 21 August. The document was signed by NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and by Ukrainian Ambassador to NATO Ihor Sagach on behalf of the Ukrainian President.

 
In an extraordinary move, President Medvedev has announced that he will not be sending an Ambassador to the Ukraine. In an open letter to Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, he has accused his neighbours of attempting to sever economic ties with Russia, of glorifying Nazism, and even complaining a bit too much about the Holomodor, the famine engineered by Stalin that killed millions of Ukrainians in 1932-33.