Posted on 11/25/2004 3:08:26 PM PST by neverdem
KIEV, Ukraine, Nov. 25 - Prime Minister Viktor F. Yanukovich, the official winner of Ukraine's disputed presidential election, offered a series of concessions to his opposition today, hoping to break the nation's political impasse, even as a court decision left open the possibility of a legal challenge to his legitimacy as president-elect.
A frantic legal and political battle is under way for public authority and perception, and the first results from Ukraine's highest court appeared to favor Victor A. Yushchenko, the opposition candidate.
Mr. Yanukovich's offer included guarantees for legal amnesty to members of the opposition, as well as a pledge to protect opposition and minority political rights in the future, to encourage more independent voices in the Ukrainian news media and to shift unspecified powers in the presidency to the Supreme Rada, Ukraine's legislative branch.
The offer was made on national television even as tens of thousands of people continued their antigovernment rallies here in the capital. But it was promptly rejected by Mr. Yushchenko, who has filed a lawsuit in the nation's Supreme Court seeking to overturn the official results. His staff predicted the court challenge would prevail.
"We will never, never accept the results of this election," said Oleg Rybachuk, a member of parliament and Mr. Yushchenko's chief of staff, saying it had been tilted in the prime minister's direction "by gross fabrication."
Mr. Yushchenko spent the day trying to expand his support and secure symbolic victories, while also trying to gain legal traction against the government in court and to gauge the effects of a national strike that he hopes will force Mr. Yanukovich and Leonid D. Kuchma, the outgoing president, to nullify the results.
In a ruling today, the court ordered that the election results not be published by the government in newspapers until allegations of fraud and electoral abuse had been reviewed, an order that while inconclusive buoyed the opposition and was met with roars of approval in Independence Square.
"This Supreme Court decision is a benchmark in the fight to overturn the election," Mr. Rybachuk said, in a telephone interview not long after the results were announced.
He said the opposition's reading of the law indicated that election results were not binding until they were published in government notifications and that Mr. Yushchenko had managed to stop their publication just in time.
But minutes later, the independent Channel 5 reported that the government was rushing its election notification to print and would ignore its judicial branch. The report could not immediately be confirmed.
With the country in a deadlock and the moves between the two camps accelerating, Mr. Yushchenko appeared several times during the day with Lech Walesa, the Nobel Laureate and founder of the Solidarity movement in Poland, who had come to Kiev to urge both sides to refrain from violence and to negotiate their differences. Mr. Walesa's sentiments seemed clearly with the opposition.
"All of my life I have been fighting for these ideals," he said in a brief appearance before reporters. "There is no free Poland without a free Ukraine.
Later, on the stage in Independence Square, Mr. Walesa told the thousands of assembled demonstrators that he admired their spirit and would support their efforts. He urged them not to relent.
"You can rely on the support of Poland and Walesa," he said. "But we cannot do it for you. You have to do it yourselves."
Ukraine has been locked in a political stalemate since Monday, when preliminary results of presidential runoff on Sunday suggested a 3-point victory by Mr. Yanukovich.
International election observers reported extensive and highly organized state fraud had assisted the prime minister. And as demonstrators began streaming into the capital, Western governments, including the United States, urged President Kuchma not to make the results official.
Mr. Kuchma's government validated the results on Wednesday, pushing the nation of 48 million deeper into disarray.
The events today showed the calculations and thinking behind Mr. Kuchma's and Mr. Yanukovich's coordinated moves, but they also suggested Mr. Yanukovich's once-autocratic hold on the country was no longer complete.
Mr. Yushchenko has a very large and organized following, including a savvy youth movement that appears to have the energy and endurance to demonstrate for an extended time. The mood in the capital is unmistakably behind him, and Western leaders and governments have backed his call for investigations into fraud and for a fair election to determine the presidency.
But for all of the moral support that has been attached to his democracy drive, Mr. Yushchenko had until today failed to bring essential elements of Mr. Kuchma's government to his side, and members of Mr. Yanukovich's campaign and Mr. Kuchma's inner circle said they believe he may have crested.
Alex Vasilyev, head of Mr. Kuchma's information department, described the demonstrations as "political theater."
Many signs had not been encouraging for opposition.
Mr. Yushchenko's effort to challenge the vote in parliament failed when he could not muster a quorum to convene a special session, and he was similarly unable to prevent the Central Election Commission from assembling a quorum to rush through results that declared him the official loser.
And while Ukraine's military, police and intelligence services have not moved against him, through this evening they had not shown strong signs of support and had done little to discourage the bands of Yanukovich supporters who have begun wandering the capital, often taunting the opposition side.
Mr. Yanukovich's campaign manager, Sergei Tihipko, said the offer to negotiate today, beginning with the four concessions by the prime minister, were meant to begin calming the streets after what he called the prime minister's irrevocable victory.
"Now we can speak of the steps to take to release the tension," he said. He also said that he was not worried by any court challenges, and that the victory would stand. "Nobody, even the Supreme Court, can cancel it."
Soon thereafter, when the court ruling this evening suggested that Mr. Yushchenko still had a chance, it was the opposition that claimed the momentum had shifted.
"It means that now we can forget about a Yanukovich inauguration in the near future," Mr. Rybachuk said. "It will mean that we can forget about it at all."
Could I be enlighten ?
I am sure you could be.
Russia funded Yanukovych's campaign to the tune of 300 million. Don't pretend that you care about foreigners influencing free elections.
Cause the Russians did it in the Ukraine - China can finance campaigns in America? Why are you against living by the golden rule? I find it troubling Americans get involved in other nations elections yet we Americans have fits when we hear of the exact same thing done to us.
Why don't China and Russia live by the Golden Rule?
I will ask you plain out - would you allow other countries to support candidates in America? If not why do you allow Americans to support other foreign candidates?
kievan rus is ukraine not russia. russian propoganda under the soviet regime not only stole ukraines history but also its culture.
The Rus were nordic princes "invited" by the slavic Kievans to rule them.
The Bolshevik animals purged Russia of all that noble blood.
yeah actually there is look at a map. it is an embattled nation trying to come out from communism, and is having a hard time. but it sure as hell is right there. the main religions are ukrainian catholic and ukrainian orthodox. not ukrainian russian orthodox.
ukes and russiand DEFINATELY consider themselves seperate people. ukrainians are much closer to poland then they are to russia.
although the dialects are distinct enough to be counted as separate
ukrainian is not a dialect, it is a seperate language from russian. always has been.
Ukranian Catholics - Latin and Greek Rite Catholics.
For the Ukranian Orthodox - There is the schismatic Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church the so-called Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate (I think they are also schismatics) and the true canonical Church - the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. I hope that was more accurate for you.
that was beautiful.
2 different kinds of Catholics - 3 different kinds of Orthodox! Not very culturaly united from my point of view. Ukraine has too many fault lines to be used the way Russia and the West are using it as a football.
If you'll check the yellow pages of any american town, you'll see that we have many more religious sects than that. By some of the standards being given for Ukrainian legitimacy, or lack thereof, we shouldn't be a country at all.
Thanks. "Dialect" versus "language" gets a little nebulous, and has very political consequences. And its not something I'm qualified to answer. I understood that Uk and Russian were mutually intelligible, but of course I realize that is a very subjective standard even of itself.
So I'll take your word for it.
In any case, I prefer to err on the side of Uk independence. If they eventually join the EU, I don't see that as anti-American, it will help to dilute the Franco-German axis a little more. So I'm fine with it.
In any case, trying to be too geopolitical about all of this is to lose track of the original question. Is the election stolen? If it is, it needs to be done again. Or, the guilty party should just be disqualified and the other awarded the victory.
And, the fact that Kuchma must rely on Russian troops for his security speaks volumes about who it was that stole the election.
USA is a diff. animal all together. All European countries are based on a homogenous population.
Granted.
You're confusing the term, Rus with the modern term, Russian. Tsk. Tsk.
From P. Magocsi, "A History of Ukraine" pg. 68
For the longest time, English-language writings did not distiguish the name Rus' from Russia, with the result that in descriptions of the pre-fourteenth century Kievan realm the conceptually distorted formulation Kievan Russia was used.
It was the Kievan metropolitan that moved from Kyiv to first Vladimir then onto populated Moscow not the populace.
And I'm sure you're aware that the empire with the name, Russia, was not to come until centuries later.
The Byzantine Greeks introduced the name Rus - it means Russian.
LOL!!!! What no mention of Varangians or Finns? Since you're not lucky enough to be Slav and Eastern Slavic history is not your forte, all I can do is recommend a library or go to a good website with a timeline. The term Rus was well used before the introduction of Christianity.
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