Deputies in a pushing match during a session in the chamber of the Ukrainian parliament in Kiev, July 3, 2012, during a vote on a bill about the basics of the language policy. — Reuters picKIEV, July 4 — Ukraine’s parliament speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn tendered his resignation today after deputies of the majority Regions Party rushed a contentious language bill through a second and final reading the day before.

“Colleagues, I ask you to consider my resignation and take a decision on it,” Lytvyn told an opening session of parliament.

The bill, which cannot become law until first Lytvyn and then President Viktor Yanukovich have signed it, would upgrade the status of the Russian language in the former Soviet republic where the official state language is Ukrainian.

Lytvyn’s move followed a night of protest in Kiev with the opposition — which sees the bill as a potential threat to Ukrainian sovereignty — organising demonstrations outside a building where Yanukovich was due to speak today. — Reuters