President Viktor Yushchenko pressed home his call on Friday to resolve a row over ownership of a metal plant, demanding quick action to transfer it to state hands from a group linked to Ukraine's former leaders.
Yushchenko, critical of his government's performance in ending mass rallies at the Nikopol ferro-alloy plant, gave prosecutors and the justice ministry three days to return the plant's shares to state ownership.
Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko pledged to implement his orders to take back the plant from the Pridneprovie group of Viktor Pinchuk, son-in-law of ex-president Leonid Kuchma. She said her government had launched new action challenging the selloff of another plant bought by another big industrial group.
A presidential order, announced by spokeswoman Iryna Gerashchenko, said contradictory legal rulings had "incited people to undertake illegal acts". It set the deadline "to complete the legal transfer of state shares from the Nikopol plant to the State Property Fund".
Gerashchenko said the president, brought to power last year on a wave of "Orange Revolution" protests, had had "a very serious discussion with the government".
The plant was sold in 2003 to Pinchuk's Pridneprovie group, but courts have since ruled the sale illegal.
A new board of directors was elected at an extraordinary shareholders' meeting this week. But a local court barred the new management from taking over at the plant in eastern Ukraine, pending proof that shares have been returned to the state.
Pinchuk told Reuters this week he had acquired the plant fairly and the new authorities were trying to seize it by force.
Three channels controlled by Pinchuk's business interests have shown lengthy footage of workers massed at the plant voicing support for the former owners.
The prime minister promised decisive action.
"If there is a will not just to stage a show but to install the state's representatives, there will be no problem," she told a news conference. "The Nikopol plant will be returned to state hands despite Pinchuk's weeping."
She said her government had launched action to overturn the privatisation of a ferro-alloy plant in the eastern city of Zaporizha - owned by the Privat group of wealthy businessmen.
"For us, all enterprises are the same," she said.
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