Tymoshenko nominated Ukraine PM

Yulia Tymoshenko is tipped to be a future presidential candidate

Ukraine's pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko has nominated his Orange Revolution ally Yulia Tymoshenko for the post of prime minister.

Parliament now has to vote on her candidacy. Her bloc and the pro-Yushchenko Our Ukraine party have a majority of just two in the assembly.

Ukraine has been plagued by months of political deadlock.

Mr Yushchenko and Ms Tymoshenko led the 2004 Orange Revolution, which ousted a Moscow-backed presidential candidate.

Mr Yushchenko became president after huge street protests, defeating his bitter rival, Viktor Yanukovych, whose election had been widely condemned as fraudulent.

The "Orange" allies have a slim majority in Ukraine's parliament

On Tuesday the "Orange" allies succeeded in getting their candidate, Arseniy Yatsenyuk of Our Ukraine, elected parliamentary speaker.

Mr Yushchenko named Ms Tymoshenko prime minister in early 2005, but sacked her in September of that year amid divisions in the Orange camp.

Since then, the president has had fraught relations with Mr Yanukovych, who became prime minister after staging a dramatic political comeback in parliamentary elections last year.

His Party of the Regions came top again in early parliamentary elections in September, called to resolve the country's political crisis. But the party did not win enough seats to form a government. The rival pro-Western parties then agreed to form a coalition.