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Control of defiant volunteer battalions is Ukrainian authorities’ big headache

ZAMYATINA Tamara

Who will gain control of the volunteer battalions in Ukraine?

MOSCOW, November 12. /TASS/. Who will gain control of the volunteer battalions - spearhead of the Kiev authorities’ crackdown on independence-seeking south-eastern regions - has become one of the main intrigues in the process of forming the ruling coalition in the national parliament - the Verkhovna Rada - after the October 26 parliamentary elections.

To the disappointment of President Petro Poroshenko the Popular Front party under Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk emerged the winner. The presidential bloc fell just 0.3% behind, but Yatsenyuk, his chin boldly up, feels free to dictate coalition terms to the president. In the meantime, Ukraine is in a state of semi-war, so winning to one’s side the army, the police and the security service as well as the volunteer battalions, which formally obey nobody, is a question of retaining power for both the president and the prime minister.

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