[Ohio UZO News] Ukrainian elections: selected items WH; OSCE; NYT; Economist; KP

Fri Feb 12 13:55:08 EST 2010

I will not try to reproduce all of the numerous press and other items that appeared while I was in Ukraine observing the elections for the OSCE - this time in Odesa.  My partner, Canadian MP Martha Findlay-Hall and I reached the same conclusions in our observations that the overwhelming majority of the other 600 + OSCE observers representing 45 countries did --  that they were conducted in a way that conformed to high standards, despite some shortcomings. For more specifics, see the OSCE press release below, which includes OSCE Preliminary Statement.  I've included only a few of the most recent items - you can find earlier coverage in newspapers such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Financial Times and many other sources.  

Orest Deychakiwsky

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

_______________________________________________________________________________________

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

February 11, 2010

Readout of the President's call with President-elect Yanukovych of Ukraine

President Obama called Victor Yanukovych of Ukraine today to congratulate him on his election and wish him success in carrying out his mandate.  The President commended the Ukrainian people on the conduct of their February 7 vote.  This peaceful expression of the political will of Ukrainian voters is another positive step in strengthening democracy in Ukraine.  They agreed on the importance of continuing cooperation on nuclear non-proliferation.  They also wished each other's athletes success in the Vancouver Olympic Games.      

The strategic partnership between the United States and Ukraine is based on shared interests and values.  These include expanding democracy and prosperity, protecting security and territorial integrity, strengthening the rule of law, promoting non-proliferation, and supporting reform in Ukraine's economic and energy sectors.  The United States looks forward to working with President-elect Yanukovych and continuing to strengthen our cooperation with Ukraine's government and its Parliamentary leaders.   

OSCE

Press release

Run-off confirms that Ukraine's presidential election meets most international commitments 

http://www.osce.org/odihr/item_1_42681.html

The New York Times

Prime Minister Is Refusing To Concede In Ukraine 

By CLIFFORD J. LEVY 

12 February 2010

Late Edition - Final

6

MOSCOW -- President Obama on Thursday congratulated Viktor F. Yanukovich on winning Ukraine's presidential election, increasing the pressure on his opponent, Prime Minister Yulia V. Tymoshenko, to concede.

But Ms. Tymoshenko, making her first appearance since losing the election on Sunday, said nothing about bowing out, and her aides continued to charge that the voting was tainted by fraud.

The White House said that Mr. Obama had called Mr. Yanukovich, the Ukrainian opposition leader, and wished him ''success in carrying out his mandate.''

''This peaceful expression of the political will of Ukrainian voters is another positive step in strengthening democracy in Ukraine,'' it said in a statement.

Ukraine has been the site of a struggle for influence between Russia and the West in recent years, and Mr. Yanukovich is considered closer to the Kremlin than Ms. Tymoshenko is. So Mr. Obama's decision to congratulate Mr. Yanukovich seemed a blow to any plans by Ms. Tymoshenko to contest the election results.

European monitors said the balloting was fair. But Ms. Tymoshenko's aides insisted that fraud was rampant. ''We do not understand the conclusions of the international observers,'' said Sergei Paskhalov, an official from her party.

Ms. Tymoshenko is in a complicated position if she wants to discredit the election observers' reports.

When she helped lead the 2004 Orange Revolution, which overturned a presidential election won by Mr. Yanukovich that was deemed fraudulent, she cited findings of the same observers to bolster her arguments.

The Economist

February 11, 2009

Turn east, Lady Ashton

The EU could make a real difference in Ukraine

PIGEONHOLING and false analogies are not part of formal international relations studies. But from the way that diplomats, policymakers and analysts talk about Ukraine, you would think they were compulsory courses. 

Take the optimistic point that Ukraine's elections are now unlike Russia's. True, Ukrainian voters had a real choice in that country's recent presidential poll. The incumbent, Viktor Yushchenko, gave up power peacefully. (In Russia, he might have handed power over to an ex-spook, amid bogus terrorist attacks to panic the public into accepting authoritarian rule). The vote count was fair. Ukraine's media is far more pluralist than Russia's. And so on. All this is fine. But Ukraine's election was also unlike Kazakhstan's. It is easy to make something look good by choosing a dismal comparator.

It is also tempting but wrong to compare Ukraine now with Russia in the 1990s. True, oligarchs rule the roost in both countries, with politicians as their puppets. True, Western money keeps Ukraine afloat, as it did in 1990s Russia. There, the West hoped to avert nuclear anarchy or a Communist revanche. In Ukraine the money is intended to stave off take-over by Russia.

But there is no sign of, or appetite for, a Ukrainian version of Vladimir Putin, not least because the West has not (yet) incinerated its credibility in Ukraine the way it did in Russia in the 1990s. Ukrainian politicians of all stripes, and the public, continue to want European values and European integration.

Brussels has yet to respond to that desire. European leaders missed the chance presented by the orange revolution (though to be fair, Mr Yushchenko and other Ukrainian politicians botched their opportunities even more badly). The European Union's leaders also failed to make much of the recent election. Ukraine is a long way from Spain, which holds the rotating EU presidency. Catherine Ashton, the EU's nominal foreign-policy chief, seems distracted, to put it mildly. The EU is treating Ukraine like Turkey-too big, too poor, and destined to wait indefinitely for membership. (That's a false comparison too, but never mind).

Yet Ukraine is perhaps the one place where Lady Ashton and her new External Action Service could make a real difference. Ukraine badly needs attention, and unlike America or China it is not a place over which other EU leaders will be jostling for influence. Done properly, the gains from renewed EU involvement could be huge.

The European policy so far has been engagement with Ukraine's political class. This has proved expensive, and mostly fruitless. Attention should now move to the citizenry. Imagine the effect if the EU opened 50 "Europe Houses" in the main towns and cities of Ukraine. The excellent new House of Europe in Tbilisi should be the model. That project aims to be the Georgian centre for all sorts of Europe-related cultural events, as well as debates and lectures, with a library and internet café as added attractions (readers with spare cash please note: it needs donors). It will have far more impact than the piecemeal efforts of individual European countries' cultural institutes. 

In the tense Ukrainian region of Crimea, a big EU presence would make it harder for Russia to hide its mischief-making (that should be a lesson from Georgia, where the EU's absence was a lethal element in the run up to the 2008 war). More generally, the new policy will focus the EU's biggest asset: its soft power. The EU's military capability is meagre; its ability to stand up to Russian divide-and-rule tactics in energy security is feeble. But the EU does have something that the Kremlin doesn't: attractiveness. Projecting that into Ukraine will give Lady Ashton and her staff something worthwhile to do. It could even work.

Kyiv Post

February 11

By John Marone

Tymoshenko cries foul: What's her case? 

Victor Yanukovych, the man accused of trying to steal Ukraine's presidency in 2004, is now being roundly recognized as the country's next president, following his slim victory over Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko in the Feb. 7 runoff. By everyone except Tymoshenko, that is. 

Tymoshenko's team has vowed to continue challenging the vote results, alleging large-scale election fraud and demanding a recount in some districts, in what analysts are interpreting as her attempt to set up a future moral advantage in the next electoral race.

Tymoshenko herself has remained silent in the days following the vote.

"How do you explain this silence?" asked political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko. "It's not the 'silence of the lambs,' but more likely the lioness preparing to pounce, to defend its interests," Fesenko said, describing Tymoshenko's moves as "tactical" efforts to save face and preserve herself as the number one opposition leader.

According to the preliminary results published by the Central Electoral Commission, Yanukovych beat his old foe from Ukraine's 2004 Orange Revolution by only three and a half percentage points.

But Tymoshenko's camp is questioning the validity of as many as 900,000 ballots - enough to make a difference in the final outcome.

"She really believes that Yanukovych's team stole 900,000 votes, and most of the party is going along with this thinking out of solidarity," said Vadym Karasyov, a political adviser to outgoing president Victor Yushchenko.

But, he added, there is little chance that the elections will be overturned. "At best, she will get a recount of some electoral districts," Karasyov said.

The goal of this tactic, according to the analyst, is to leave voters with a memory of reasonable doubt as to who really won in 2010.

"When, or if [Yanukovych's] Regions party takes power and starts breaking the law, people will ask us what we did to prevent this and we will have to answer them. This is our civil and political duty," said Oleksandr Sochka, a lawmaker from Tymoshenko's BYuT faction in parliament.

"Yanukovych did the same thing after 2004, by never acknowledging accusations that he took part in widespread fraud," added Karasyov.

This year, however, the Donetsk strongman is demanding that Tymoshenko concede defeat. "The government does not plan to resign voluntarily," came Tymoshenko's reply, through First Deputy Prime Minister Oleksander Turchynov.

In the meantime, Tymoshenko's camp has already filed a lawsuit with the Kyiv Court of Appeals regarding the validity of results from territorial commissions.

Another suit with the High Administrative Court will rule on the final decision of CEC, which is still forthcoming.

"This isn't about numbers, but about legality. It doesn't matter by how much we lost. The Ukrainian people have the right to know the truth," said Sochka.

But as early as the day after the Feb. 7 vote, international observers were already endorsing the fairness of the election, in a 180 degree turn from their position in 2004. The implication was a tacit request for Tymoshenko to acknowledge defeat for sake of stability.

"Yesterday's vote was an impressive display of democratic elections. For everyone in Ukraine, this election was a victory. It is now time for the country's political leaders to listen to the people's verdict and make sure that the transition of power is peaceful and constructive," Joao Soares, president of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and Special Co-ordinator of the OSCE short-term observers, said during a Feb. 8 press conference.

Soares was flanked at the conference by fellow election monitors from other prestigious Western organizations such as the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), the Parliamentary Assembly of NATO, The European parliament and the OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR). NATO parliamentary assembly representative Assen Agov said the vote was "a perfect conduct of election. By accepting the results, Ukrainian politicians will complete this peaceful and orderly process."

Oleksandr Chernenko, chairman of the Western-funded Committee of Ukrainian Voters, said violations were present and widespread during the runoff, but one side was as much at fault as the other.

Regarding claims by Tymoshenko's camp that their candidate had lost almost one million votes due to fraud, he said, "I don't see any evidence to support that claim." Compared to 2004, violations were much fewer, but higher than during the 2006 and 2007 parliamentary elections.

Common violations cited by Tymoshenko's camp included home voting and the busing of candidates to voting stations. Tymoshenko's camp claims that a suspiciously high number of voters voted from home - more than 1 million - and that much of these individuals did not have proper permission to do so.

Chernenko said home voting was higher in the runoff than in the first round, by one or two percentage points, "which is well within the norm." But Tymoshenko allies said violations in home voting, alone, could have put Yanukovych on top.

A more objective indicator of the fairness of the poll, according to Chernenko, is the turnout. For example, Chernenko said the turnout in Yanukovych's home region of Donetsk was 96 percent in the second (infamously fraudulent) round of 2004, 84 percent in third (internationally accepted) round of 2004, but only 76 percent on Feb. 7.

"A common violation observed was the offering of money for votes, which was happening all over," Chernenko added.

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