Ukraine's ex-PM to go on trial Friday

Ukraine's former premier and Orange Revolution leader Yulia Tymoshenko will go on trial Friday for signing a gas deal with Russia that allegedly cost the government $200 million, officials said. The hearing on charges of abuse of power will beging at 0600 GMT at central Kiev's Pechersk Court, Tymoshenko's spokeswoman Natalia Lysova said. She is accused of causing a loss to the former Soviet republic's budget of 1.5 billion hryvnia ($190 million) when she signed a new contract with Russia after a brief interruption of gas deliveries in early 2009. Tymoshenko has dismissed this and other charges against her as a vendetta led by the more Russia-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych, who beat her in a tightly-contested election last year. Relations between Tymoshenko's government and Russia's gas monopoly have been under investigation in Ukraine for nearly two years. She signed the deal with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Moscow after Russia's Gazprom gas monopoly temporarily cut off shipments to Ukraine following Kiev's refusal to meet Moscow's higher price demands. The cut-off also briefly affected major European countries. Tymoshenko's decision to agree to Russia's demands in Moscow led to a restoration of the deliveries but also undermined her government's reputation.