The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, on Thursday accused the United States and the European Union of encouraging ”mayhem” on the streets of Ukraine, and warned them against interfering further in the current election crisis.
Speaking after a failed EU-Russia summit in the Hague, he told the international community to let the Ukrainian issue be decided in the courts.
His remarks came as the Ukrainian supreme court blocked Viktor Yanukovich, Russia’s favoured candidate who was declared the winner on Wednesday by a 3% margin, from assuming the presidency.
The court said the results could not be officially published until after a hearing on Monday into dozens of complaints from the opposition into alleged election fraud.
Yanukovich cannot become president until the results are officially published.
The opposition leader, Viktor Yushchenko, hailed the court’s ruling when he addressed tens of thousands of supporters crowded into Kiev’s Independence Square for the fifth day in a row. ”This is only the beginning,” he said. ”It is proof that it is society that always wins. It is small compensation for the suffering that we have endured.”
The crisis has the potential to produce the biggest rift between Putin and the US since the Iraq war last year and increase existing tensions between Russia and the EU.
The row overshadowed an EU-Russia summit which was intended to put together a package of measures covering security and trade but which broke up without agreement.
At a press conference afterwards, Putin issued an implicit rebuke to both the US and the EU, though he did not mention either by name. The US has said it will not accept the results as they stand, and the EU has said Sunday’s poll was seriously flawed.
Putin suggested they stand aside. ”We should not introduce in the practice of international life a means of addressing similar disputes through mayhem on the street,” he said. ”All claims should go to the courts.
”We don’t believe it is our right to interfere in any way in the electoral process or impose our opinion on the Ukranian people.”
Relations between Russia and the EU have been tense much of this year, with Putin unnerved by expansion eastwards of the EU towards Russia.
Moscow overtly supported Yanukovich throughout the campaign. Putin, who visited Kiev twice during the campaign, on Thursday sent congratulations to Yanukovich and anticipated him bringing ”the Russian-Ukrainian strategic partnership to a new level”.
A general strike and campaign of civil disobedience, called by the opposition earlier this week and scheduled to begin on Thursday, produced only patchy responses.
Markian Bilynskyj, an opposition analyst, said that if the supreme court failed to produce the right result for Yushchenko, his supporters would set about paralysing the country’s communications network. He suggested army units in the west could disrupt pipelines carrying Russian gas and oil to Europe.
Ruslana Lezhychko, the Ukrainian winner of the Eurovision song contest, announced a hunger strike in support of the opposition. Hundreds of state TV journalists also began protesting. And on Thursday night, approximately 100 members of a police unit went over to the protesters’ side — one of them read a statement of support and the crowd shouted ”Good guys!”
As the crowd showed no signs of ebbing — despite a temperature of minus 6C — hopes of a political compromise that would satisfy both sides seemed to fade.
Yushchenko also appeared to reject backroom deals saying any negotiations would be ”transparent”. – Guardian Unlimited Â