Kiev - Cash shortages have left Ukraine's military unable to feed peacekeeping troops deployed overseas, Sehodnia newspaper reported Friday. Ukraine's Ministry of Defence for peacekeeper troop maintenance has thus far been budgeted 9.2 million dollars, against a planned 40 million dollars, said Viktor Korendonovych, an Army spokesman.

"At this rate, we will not be able to feed out troops past May," he said.

Peacekeeping operations affected by the shortage would include Ukrainian troop deployments to Liberia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan.

Chisinau/Kiev - Moldovan demonstrations against a Communist election win were muted in size and intensity on Friday, as President Vladimir Voronin called for a recount of the results. Between seven and nine hundred marchers carrying flowers had gathered in the centre of the Moldovan capital Chisinau by midday. Almost all the protestors were student age.

The demonstration was, in contrast to protests of earlier days, largely silent. The flowers symbolized "peace" and "nonviolence," marchers said.

Kiev/Moscow - Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko for the first time suggested an openness to having early elections as around 50,000 opposition supporters protested in Kiev on Friday against the forces of the president's so-called Orange Revolution of 2004.

Yushchenko was ready "to make a decision about simultaneous (presidential and parliamentary) elections," the Interfax news agency quoted the Ukrainian head of state as saying, adding that: "I have no fear of early elections."

Kiev - Ukraine's parliament has voted to hold presidential elections in the country in October, earlier than expected in a further sign of resistance to the government of incumbent Viktor Yushchenko.

In the Ukrainian parliament, the Rada, 401 of 422 representatives voted on Wednesday for the presidential poll to be held on October 25, earlier than a previously suggested date in January 2010, the end of Yushchenko's mandate.

Kiev - Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko on Tuesday proposed a massive overhaul of the country's constitution, an idea rejected almost immediately by opposition leaders.

The proposal includes making Parliament bicameral, with a national assembly of short-term members of parliament (MPs) responsible for day-to-day legislation, particularly fiscal policy. A long-serving senate would be responsible for most official appointments of, among others, judges and ministers.

Kiev  - Hundreds of striking Ukrainian bus drivers blocked key roads in Kiev to protest against increased licensing fees and allegedly oppressive city government regulations, snarling traffic and stranding thousands of motorists.

More than 700 privately-owned buses were parked on Kiev's main thoroughfare the Khreshchatyk by early morning, causing commuter delays of up to an hour.

The bus drivers were demonstrating against transportation licensing fees hikes newly-enacted by Kiev city mayor Leonid Chernovetsky.