Threats mar Ukraine's PM vote

The Party of the Regions in Ukraine has demanded an apology from the Orange coalition over allegations it tampered with electronic voting during Yulia Timoshenko's nomination for Prime Minister. She lost by just one vote.

The party says it will only take part in parliament again when the claims are retracted.

A vote could still be held later Thursday on Timoshenko's bid for Prime Minister- this time replacing electronic voting with hand counting.

In another twist, there are reports of Timoshenko receiving death threats

Ukrainian political analyst Oleg Voloshin says the Orange coalition is a spent force in Ukraine, and the only way out of the current political crisis is a coalition between President Yushchenko's Our Ukraine party and Yanukovich's Party of the Regions.

“I really doubt that the Orange coalition is a good idea for Ukraine today. But the difficulty is that Mr Yushchenko understands that the Orange electorate, which he served to together with Yulia Timoshenko, is his strong supporter. And he is not a risky President enough to come out to the public and say that he understands that Orange coalition is not going to work for the country and that he started negotiating a coalition with the Party of the Regions,” he said.

“This initiative originates from the camp of Mr Yanukovich, whose party never rejected the opportunity of creating such union. And the formation of this coalition is the only way to overcome the current political crisis in Ukraine. But Mr Yushchenko is really afraid of loosing his supporters. I suggest that he would agree to form such a coalition only if Yulia Timoshenko will personally come out to the public and say that she is leaving all the attempts of forming an Orange coalition,” Oleg Voloshin commented.