Opposition hails victory in Ukraine

• Source: Global Times
• [08:12 February 09 2010]
• Comments

By Liu Dong

Opposition leader Viktor Yanukovich claimed victory Sunday in the Ukraine's presidential election – the first since the 2004 "Orange Revolution" – but his bitter rival, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, has rejected defeat and threatened to challenge the results if signs of fraud are found.

The results were extremely close as Yanukovich, 59, claimed 48.49 percent of the vote in the runoff election, compared with 49-year-old Tymoshenko's 45.86 percent, Reuters reported.

Incumbent president Victor Yushchenko came in fifth in the first round of the election in January.

When the results were in, Yanukovich urged the prime minister to resign from office. But media reports said she responded by saying, "It's too early to draw conclusions. I ask everyone to fight for every result, every document, every vote."

Ukrainian electoral officials set up 33,496 polling stations across 225 constituencies, and the Central Electoral Commission said it erected 113 electoral wards overseas.

"I will do everything to ensure that the citizens of the Ukraine, no matter where in the country they live, feel comfortable and calm in a stable country," Yanukovich stated late Sunday at his Kiev-based campaign headquarters, according to The New York Times.

Differing from the West-oriented Tymoshenko, Yanukovich hasn't expressed a desire for NATO membership, and he has sought to enhance ties with Europe and Russia.

"Yanukovich's expected grasping of the reins will herald a transformation of Ukraine's political scenario," Xing Guangcheng, deputy director at the Center of Borderland History and Geography Research at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times.

The country was jolted from Russia's sphere of influence by Yushchenko and Tymoshenko, who jointly orchestrated the "Orange Revolution" designed to pursue NATO membership, a free market and a democratic political regime.

"Nevertheless, the initiatives advanced by them, rigidly modeled on the Western style, failed to address the Ukraine's internal problems. The entanglement in the severe power struggle triggered the ultimate disintegration of the coalition. In addition, increasing alienation from Russia took a considerable toll on its economic development. Consequently, its overall national strength, plagued by the combination of all these factors, was mired in a spiraling deterioration," Xing added.

"The stepping down of Yushchenko, coupled with the defeat of the pro-West Tymoshenko, demonstrates the setbacks of the Orange Revolution and policy re-orientation," Xing noted.

"In the global arena, the Ukraine, occupying a strategically significant position, constitutes a pivotal stronghold for the US to contain Russia in the Baltic and Black seas, and the new president's foreign strategic orientation will exert a direct impact on the US, Russia's contention of influence and the balance of power in this region," Xing noted.

"The dramatic failure of the Ukraine's 'color revolution' serves as a reminder to China that any model has its own limitations and indiscriminate imitation of the West is not automatically effective in another regime. Only following an approach modeled on an individual nation's unique circumstances will guarantee benefits for people," noted Xia Yishan, a researcher at the China Institute of International Studies.

Agencies contributed to this story