Blockade halts Yushchenko convoy

A pro-opposition convoy trying to rally support for presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko was turned back from his rival’s home town today after Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych’s supporters blocked the road.

The confrontation outside the eastern city of Donetsk came five days before Ukrainians were to choose between the two candidates in a Supreme Court-ordered revote of last month’s fraudulent presidential election.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who openly supported Yanukovych in the first two rounds of voting, said today that the Kremlin could work with a Yushchenko administration, repeating an earlier promise to work with whomever is elected.

“We have worked with Yushchenko already and the cooperation was not bad ... If he wins, I don’t see any problems,” he said during a visit to Germany.

The 50 car pro-Yushchenko convoy – dubbed the Friendship Journey – was halted about a miles outside the industrial city, where about 300 cars adorned with Yanukovych’s blue and white banners waited.

As the convoy approached, the Yanukovych supporters sounded their horns and blocked the entrance into the city. The convoy retreated and decided to head to Kharkiv, an eastern city where support for Yushchenko is higher.

Carrying 185 people, mainly artists and musicians, the convoy is travelling around this nation of 48 million trying to rally support for Yushchenko and spread information about the mass protests that paralysed the Ukrainian capital for more than two weeks after the last month’s runoff.

The campaign has split the country, with the west and Ukraine’s cosmopolitan capital backing reformist, Western-leaning Yushchenko, while the Kremlin-backed Yanukovych has received strong support from the industrial east, which favours closer ties with Russia. Several eastern regions supporting Yanukovych threatened to hold referendums on greater autonomy from central government, but most of the plans have since been put on hold.

“Yanukovych is our president and we don’t need another,” said Kateryna Gula, wearing a Yanukovych flag as a skirt as she stood outside Donetsk.

Andriy Kuloiko, 33, said he saw no reason to let the opposition supporters into the mining city.

Olena Honchak-Kaskiv, who was travelling with the Yushchenko convoy, said they were disappointed at being turned back. The convoy had been accompanied by police vehicles and city police had given them permission to enter the city.

“We had one aim to show that we are together and that we live in one country,” she said. “Donetsk demonstrated that it is not like the rest of Ukraine.”

Most Donetsk residents watch Russian television, which has shown open favouritism toward Yanukovych and was highly critical of the so-called “orange revolution” protests in Kiev. Ukrainian television, which has recently started to present more balanced news coverage, also often lets its Donetsk studios prepare segments to be aired in the region, which differ from those seen in the rest of Ukraine.

Earlier, as many as 3,000 young Yanukovych supporters rallied outside Donetsk’s Palace of Youth, chanting “We are for Yanukovych.” They burned an effigy of Yushchenko and his fiery ally, Yuliya Tymoshenko.

“We plan to protect our choice,” said Serhiy Kireev, a Yanukovych official in Donetsk.

Yanukovych pledged to protect Ukraine’s unity, regardless of the election’s outcome and “irrespective of the position I occupy.”

“I do not intend to put up with attempts to divide Ukraine, to split Ukraine territorially, linguistically or religiously,” Yanukovych said during a meeting with foreign diplomats in Kiev.

Yanukovych and Yushchenko traded heated accusations in a live televised debate on Monday. Yushchenko charged his rival with stealing millions of votes in last month’s runoff vote, while Yanukovych warned that Yushchenko would never win over Ukraine’s east.