Special Report: Why Ukraine spurned the EU and embraced Russia - Yahoo News:
"On September 4, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich called a meeting of his political party for the first time in three years, summoning members to an old Soviet-era cinema called Zoryany in Kiev.
For three hours Yanukovich cajoled and bullied anyone who pushed for Ukraine to have closer ties to Russia. A handful of deputies from his Party of Regions complained that their businesses in Ukraine's Russian-speaking east would suffer if Yanukovich didn't agree to closer ties with Russia. That set him off.
"Forget about it ... forever!" he shouted at them, according to people who attended the meeting. Instead the president argued for an agreement to deepen trade and other cooperation with the European Union.
Some deputies implored him to change his mind, people who attended the meeting told Reuters. Businessmen warned that a deal with the EU would provoke Russia - Ukraine's former master in Soviet times - into toughening an economic blockade on Ukrainian goods. Yanukovich stood firm.
"We will pursue integration with Europe," he barked back, according to three people who attended the meeting. He seemed dead set on looking west."
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