The Supreme Rada was expected to consider legal amendments required for holding early elections, which the two arch rivals, the president and the premier, agreed upon Friday. The deal raised hopes for an end to the month-long political turmoil caused by a presidential decree to dissolve the legislature and call early elections.
The opposition, the president and prime minister had said they would attend the session. But President Viktor Yushchenko left for a working trip to Vinnitsa, about 180 miles southwest of Kiev, and Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych departed for Spain for treatment to a knee injury.
The pro-Yanukovych ruling coalition in parliament, which refused to obey the presidential decree, is now seeking a different legal foundation for the disbandment, making it self-dissolution rather than the presidential decree.
"It is totally unacceptable for us to hold [early] elections in accordance with the president's decree to dissolve Rada," said Taras Chornovil, a senior member of the ruling Party of Regions. "We will only go to the polls ... on the basis of a parliamentary ruling."
Yevhen Filindash of the Socialist Party, also a member of the ruling coalition, echoed Chornovil by saying, "We want to give legislative ground to early elections, which is not in place yet."
President Yushchenko told a news conference in Vinnitsa that early parliamentary elections in Ukraine were exclusively his competence. "It is not parliament that decides on early elections, but the president," he said.
Another point of discord for the conflicting parties is the date of the early elections. The opposition insists that the polls be set for July and the ruling coalition is pushing for the fall. The president has set early elections for June 24 in his latest decree, which the ruling coalition considers illegal.
