This week in history

Dec. 4 1925: The first issue of the all-Ukrainian newspaper Komsomolets Ukrainy was published in Kharkiv (Molod’ Ukrainy from 1943).

2004: The foreign press widely comments on the situation in this country after the Supreme Court of Ukraine ruled to cancel the results of the presidential election runoff.

Dec.5 1994: A memorandum was signed in Budapest on the granting of nuclear safety guarantees to Ukraine by the nuclear powers: the US, Britain, and Russia.

2004: The presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko said in an interview with The Daily Telegraph that his family was in hiding because it faced danger.

Dec.6 (Day of the Armed Forces of Ukraine)

2004: The New York Times published an interview with President Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine, who blamed the current crisis on both presidential candidates.

Dec.7 1934: The USSR Council of People’s Commissars resolved to abolish rationed issue of bread, flour, and cereals.

2004: US Secretary of State Colin Powell announced that the US did not intend to strengthen its influence on Ukraine.

Dec. 8 1991: Belorussia, Russia and Ukraine signed in Brest an agreement on the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

2004: The Times of London quoted an Austrian doctor Mykola Korpan as saying that the Ukrainian presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko had been poisoned.

Dec.9 1918: The Directory resolved to reinstate the Ukrainian National Republic’s law on an 8-hour working day, the collective bargaining system, and the right to go on strike.

2004: The Committee of National Redemption announced that pickets in front of the Cabinet of Ministers and the Presidential Administration, as well as tents on Kyiv’s Independence Square, would remain in place until the election rerun.

Dec.10 1637: The Pavlo But-led Coжssack and peasant army, which rose up against the Polish nobility, suffered a defeat near the town of Borovytsia.

2004: Germany and Poland suggested that the European Union grant Ukraine market-economy status if a fair presidential election is held.