"I am giving you time for this," Viktor Yushchenko said. "It is important that after consultations today, a steering group be formed in parliament, obviously from faction leaders, to decide on these matters."
He did not say how much time he was giving the parties to make a decision. Under Ukraine's constitution, the president can dissolve parliament and call snap elections if no coalition is formed within 30 days. That deadline passed October 3.
"Make your proposals as to how we should break the deadlock," he said. "Either you propose a scenario, an alternative, or if not, let us discuss in a constructive manner another democratic option - early elections."
Yushchenko spoke out Tuesday against re-forming the coalition between pro-presidential Our Ukraine and the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, saying the prime minister's party should form a new ruling alliance with either the pro-Russian Party of Regions or the Communists to avoid early parliamentary elections.
Borys Kolesnikov, a leader of the Party of Regions, said a coalition with Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko's bloc was impossible due to political differences and pledges made to voters during the previous election campaign.
The ruling coalition collapsed last month when Our Ukraine quit the ruling alliance with the Tymoshenko bloc. The move followed a vote by lawmakers from the pro-Russian opposition, backed by Tymoshenko's party, to slash the president's powers and over the premier's refusal to support the president's condemnation of Russia's military operation in Georgia.
The former-Soviet state has been plagued by political instability since the "Orange Revolution" in 2004. The last parliamentary election took place in September 2007.
