Ukraine's president elect Viktor Yushchenko with one of his political allies, `gas princess` Yulia Tymoshenko
Ukraine: president elect Viktor Yushchenko governs maidans
Viktor Yushchenko, Ukraine's opposition leader and presidential candidate, won the unprecedented third round of the highly watched election by 2.3 million votes, Central Electoral Commission of Ukraine stated December 28.Related article:Viktor Yushchenko front-runner as Ukraine to vote third timeSee also: Viktor Yushchenko front-runner as Ukraine to vote third time
Yushchenko won 51.99 percent, whereas Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych (Yanukovich, from the Russian spelling) gathetred 44.19 percent, according to the final results. Yanukovych does not accept the result and says his lawyers will appeal to the Supreme Court of Ukraine in a bid to overturn the result. Taras Chornovil, his electoral team leader, says some 5,000 complaints about the revote have been filed to date.In the meanwhile, Ukraine’s outgoing President Leonid Kuchma, in the run-up to the revote, urged both candidates to accept the official result. Yanukovych has come under increasing pressure to accept his defeat to Yushchenko.The Council of Europe called on Yanukovych today to concede his defeat."I call on all parties to accept the verdict of the ballot box and to refrain from rhetoric that may fuel division in Ukraine," said Terry Davis, the council's secretary general.
The United States encouraged Ukraine's courts to uphold the re-run election victory of Viktor Yushchenko. "We would expect that they (the judicial authorities) would conduct a fair, transparent and legal review that results in an outcome that reflects the will of the Ukrainian people," State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said. "I would note that in the aftermath of the latest vote on Sunday, most observers, both Ukrainian and foreign ... concluded that any violations that did occur would not have affected the final outcome of the vote."
Yesterday Ukraine’s transportation minister Heorhiy Kirpa, a supporter of Prime Minister and presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych, died under highly suspicious circumstances.Prosecutors opened a criminal investigation into the death of Transportation Minister. The investigation will determine whether Kirpa was driven to suicide. Kirpa had been accused in helping Yanukovych to carry out election fraud during the first two rounds of presidential election in Ukraine on Oct. 31 and Nov. 21Kirpa died shortly after he transferred $700 million as a prepayment for a large-scaled construction project and approved the hand over of a chunk of Ukraine’s railway property to a railway company close to Yanukovych and his partners.
Less than five hours ago, Viktor Yushchenko delivered an emotional speech at Maidan Nezalezhnosti, a square in the very centre of Ukraine’s capital Kyiv (Kiev), in front of tens of thousands of his supporters who permanently stayed there week after week, and called on them to renew blockade the Cabinet of Ministers building to prevent Yanukovych from holding government sessions. The first session is scheduled for tomorrow morning. "An honest government will enter into this building", Yushchenko stated, having stressed that the present cabinet of ministers "is dishonest, corrupy and is trying to steal what has not been stolen yet". Yanukovych's cabinet received a non-confidence vote from Verkhovna Rada, the country parliament, in late November.Viktor Yanukovych returned to work Tuesday after taking a vacation to campaign ahead of last Sunday's revote.
Yushchenko said his first foreign mission would be to Moscow to try to improve relations which worsened during Ukraine’s election campagn."I must show Russia that our earlier ties were deformed, they were formed by Ukrainian business clans. Our countries needed a better working relationship," Yushchenko stressed in an interview for Izvestia, a leading Moscow newspaper."We can and must turn this page if we are friends and are prepared to look one another in the eye.""Russia is a neighbour of Ukraine. It is better to argue twice with your wife than once with your neighbour," Yushchenko said, stressing that the two nations share Slavic roots, family links, culture and language.
