President of the European Council also led to their rejection. On 19 November 2009, Herman Van Rompuy, at that time Prime Minister of Belgium, was appointed the first full-time President of the European Council. The formal decision on the appointment was made after the Treaty of Lisbon came into force on 1 December 2009. The British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, said that he had unanimous backing from the 27 EU leaders at the summit in Brussels on the evening of 19 November 2009. Brown praised Van Rompuy as "a consensus builder" who had "brought a period of political stability to his country after months of
Petro Poroshenko Hungary Viktor Orbán, President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy, the OSCE Secretary General Lamberto Zannier, UN Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feldman, China's Minister of Culture Cai Wu and Ambassador of Russia to Ukraine Mikhail Zurabov Former Prime Minister of Ukraine Yulia Tymoshenko was also present. After the inauguration ceremony Tymoshenko said about Poroshenko "I think Ukraine has found a very powerful additional factor of stability". At the time of his inauguration, armed pro-Russian rebels, after disputed referendums, had declared the independence of the separatist Donetsk People's Republic and Lugansk People's Republic and controlled a large part of