Ukraine's House Speaker Cancels Rada Session on Local Elections

Ukrainian Parliament Speaker Volodymyr Groisman has cancelled the plenary session of Verkhovna Rada scheduled for Thursday, on which the lawmakers were supposed to discuss the draft law on local elections,the leader of Ukraine's Radical Party Oleh Lyashko said.

KIEV (Sputnik) — On Wednesday morning Groisman said on Facebook that “all the important questions” will be discussed at a Rada plenary session next week.

“By decision of V.Groisman the extraordinary plenary session of Rada on Thursday has been cancelled… Now the adoption of the law on local elections and a number of other important laws is threatened,” Lyashko said on Facebook.

The lawmaker added that he has no idea about the reasons behind such decision.

According to Lyashko, on the Thursday session Ukrainian lawmakers were also expected to discuss the bill to abandon a 15 percent tax on pensions, the indexation of salaries and pensions and the impeachment of the President.

According to the Minsk Agreement, elaborated by the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany in mid-Frebruary, both the Constitutional reform in Ukraine aimed at power decentralization and local elections in particular districts of Donbas region are to take place before the end of 2015

Earlier in July, head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) Alexander Zakharchenko announced that local DPR elections would be held on October 18 and Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) leader Igor Plotnitsky has set elections in LPR for November 1.