Yushchenko savours victory, but court challenge likely

Opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko savoured his apparent victory in Ukraine’s presidential election rerun today, but his opponent’s supporters vowed to challenge the results in court in what could be yet another protracted legal battle.

The vast tent camp set up by Yushchenko supporters on Kiev’s main avenue after last month’s fraud-plagued election, which was later annulled, remained in place.

It was an indication that his backers were prepared for further tension despite his strong showing in Sunday’s election.

Official results from 99.02% of precincts gave Yushchenko 52.22% compared to Kremlin favourite Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych’s 43.99 %.

Yushchenko thanked his supporters for spending weeks camped out on freezing streets in a show of force that helped overturn results of the runoff election.

But Yanukovych did not concede, and Nestor Shufrych, a MP and Yanukovych ally, said the prime minister’s campaign would challenge the results.

“We will appeal the falsification of the vote,” Shufrych said, citing multiple voting and violations in voter lists. Yanukovych’s campaign had already filed numerous complaints to the Central Election Commission.

Twelve thousand foreign observers watched the unprecedented third-round vote to help prevent a repetition of the fraud and said today that Ukraine had made good progress toward meeting international standards for free and fair elections.

“The Ukrainian elections have moved substantially closer to meeting OSCE and other international standards,” said Bruce George, a Labour MP and head of the delegation from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and other election watchdogs.

Yushchenko, speaking to a jubilant crowd overnight in Kiev’s Independence Square, said: “Now, today, the Ukrainian people have won. I congratulate you.”

“We have been independent for 14 years but we were not free,” Yushchenko said. “Now we can say this is a thing of the past. Now we are facing an independent and free Ukraine.”

Thousands waited for another appearance by Yushchenko tonight, but their numbers were far smaller than the hundreds of thousands who had jammed the square at the height of the protests.

Tension during the fiercely fought election campaign was fuelled by the fraud allegations and Yushchenko’s claims to have been poisoned by authorities in an assassination attempt.

Doctors have confirmed he was poisoned by a nearly lethal amount of dioxin, which severely disfigured his face.

Yushchenko will need monthly blood tests to track how quickly the poison is leaving his body.

Experts say it is likely to dissipate quickly in the first few months but then slow down. Doctors have said they expect a gradual recovery, although they fear an increased long-term risk of a heart attack, cancer or other chronic diseases.

Yanukovych’s headquarters cancelled a rally they had planned for his hometown Donetsk today, a move that suggested apathy among his supporters.

Voters had faced a crucial choice. Ukraine, a nation of 48 million people, is caught between the eastward-expanding European Union and Nato, and an increasingly assertive Russia, its former imperial and Soviet-era master.

Yushchenko, a former Central Bank chief and prime minister, wants to bring Ukraine closer to the West and advance economic and political reform. The Kremlin-backed Yanukovych emphasised tightening the Slavic country’s ties with Russia as a means of maintaining stability.