KIEV, February 24. /ITAR-TASS/. Ukraine goes bankrupt, its treasury is empty, head of Batkivshchina (Fatherland) faction Arseniy Yatsenyuk told a meeting of parliamentary factions’ leaders on Monday.

“Ukraine has never faced such a financial catastrophe for all years of its independence,” he said, adding that Ukraine should immediately apply to the International Monetary Fund for financial assistance.

Yatsenyuk said he had met with the interim finance ministry. “I was given simply a frightful picture of the country’s financial situation,” he said. “We have no time. We must urgently form the government."

Interim Finance Minister Yury Kolobov said Ukraine had been in talks on urgent disbursement of macro-financial assistance with EU member-states, the United States and international financial organizations.

“We have asked our foreign partners (Poland and the United States) to issue a loan within one-two weeks. The micro-financial assistance for Ukraine may reach around $35 billion in 2014-2015,” he said.

Ukraine invited EU member-states, the US and other countries, experts from the International Monetary Fund and other international financial institutions to participate in a donor conference on disbursement of financial assistance to Ukraine “for modernization, reforms and the implementation of an association deal with the European Union,” Kolobov said.

Ukraine’s parliamentary speaker Oleksandr Turchynov, who was named interim president on Sunday, a day after the dismissal of Viktor Yanukovych, whose whereabouts remain unknown, described the country’s economic situation as catastrophic.

“We have great problems with the pension fund and the banking system,” he said. “Therefore leaders of parliamentary factions should immediately start creating a new parliamentary majority and a new government of national unity.”

The Ukrainian Pension Fund told Itar-Tass on Sunday pensions and other social allowances would be paid in February according to the schedule.