Lawmakers from three opposition factions - Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party of jailed former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, Vitali Klitschko’s UDAR and the nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) Party blocked the speaker’s rostrum on February 5.
Dozens of UDAR members, led by world heavyweight boxing champion Klitschko, have spent days and nights at the parliament’s rostrum in protest against proxy voting by members of the ruling Party of Regions, a practice dubbed “piano playing” by the Ukrainian media. The opposition’s key demand was to insure every member of parliament votes individually and that voting cards are not passed to another person.
Lawmakers are also due to vote on Ukraine’s European integration aspirations in the run-up to the Ukraine-EU summit due on February 25 in Brussels.
