Yatsenyuk to remain Ukraine PM in coalition: president

Ukraine's Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk will keep his post to lead a new coalition government after a deal between the country's pro-Western parties, President Petro Poroshenko said today.

"Due to the unity of the democratic forces, I expect that the coalition will confirm my decision to nominate Arseniy Yatsenyuk to this post," Poroshenko said in a televised address.

The parliament would vote on the proposal when it meets next week, he said.

Poroshenko, however, called for a "total renewal" of the current cabinet, as the new government faces a mammoth challenge to overcome the gravest crisis roiling the country since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.
 

Yatsenyuk, a pro-Western economic liberal, had been widely tipped to retain his post after his party pipped Poroshenko's for first place at parliamentary polls last month.

Ukraine's pro-Western parties have been locked in weeks of frantic haggling over the make-up of the new coalition, as fighting rumbles on with pro-Russian separatists in east Ukraine.

The bespectacled former lawyer has helped secure Ukraine a mammoth international USD 27-billion package to rescue its nosediving economy and has promised to steer through tough economic and anti-corruption reforms.

However, he has not managed stop the economic slide since coming to power after the ouster of pro-Kremlin leader Viktor Yanukovych in February.

Ukraine's economy is expected to contract by some nine per cent this year.