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BELARUSIAN OPPOSITION TO STAGE MARCH ON CHORNOBYL ANNIVERSARY. The Belarusian opposition is planning to stage a march in Minsk on April 26 to mark the 20th anniversary of the Chornobyl catastrophe with or without official permission from the city authorities, Belapan reported on April 11, citing opposition leader Alyaksandr Milinkevich. Milinkevich noted that the march will be a politically charged event, and the release of political prisoners will be high on its agenda. "[The march] should show the Belarusians that there are increasingly more people who are not indifferent, who are able to defend their dignity," he said. "We're beginning a siege of the fortress, an information and mobilization siege. And it is very important for us to know to what extent our civil society is ready to stand up against the regime." In the official application for permission to hold the march, Viktar Ivashkevich, deputy chairman of the Belarusian Popular Front, asked the Minsk City Executive Committee to allow some 1,000 demonstrators to gather on October Square at 6 p.m. on April 26, march along Independence Avenue to the National Academy of Sciences, and hold a rally there. JM
WILL UKRAINE HAVE AN 'ORANGE,' 'GRAND,' OR SOME OTHER COALITION? President Viktor Yushchenko met on April 11 with leaders of the five political forces that won parliamentary mandates in the March 26 elections to discuss the formation of a governing coalition, Ukrainian media reported. "We are standing at the starting line. We have time, several weeks, to walk this road with dignity," Yushchenko said at the meeting. Yuliya Tymoshenko, head of the eponymous political bloc, told journalists after the meeting that a coalition agreement between her bloc and two other allies in the 2004 Orange Revolution, Our Ukraine and the Socialist Party, may be ready by April 13. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov from Our Ukraine refused on April 11 to rule out a deal with the Party of Regions led by former Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, nor did he reject the idea of a possible "grand" coalition incorporating the Orange Revolution allies and the Party of Regions. But the Yuliya Tymoshenko Bloc press service ruled out that latter option, affirming in a press release later the same day: "Our position is clear -- the cooperation of the Yuliya Tymoshenko Bloc and the Party of Regions within a single parliamentary coalition is impossible." JM
UKRAINIAN COURT BANS PUBLISHING PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION RESULTS. The Supreme Administrative Court has prohibited publication in the newspapers "Holos Ukrayiny" and "Uryadovyy kurer" of the results of the March 26 parliamentary elections released by the Central Election Commission (TsVK) earlier this week (see "RFE/RL Newsline," April 11, 2006), Ukrainian news agencies reported, quoting TsVK member Serhiy Dubovyk. The election results acquire legal force only after publication. The court decision follows an appeal by the Natalya Vitrenko Bloc, which charged that the TsVK violated the procedure for publicizing the election results. According to the TsVK, the Natalya Vitrenko Bloc obtained 2.93 percent of the vote, thus narrowly failing to overcome the 3 percent barrier for parliamentary representation. JM