The Economist, UK
Nov 24 2004

Is Ukraine set for conflict or compromise?

Nov 24th 2004
>>From The Economist Global Agenda

Supporters of Viktor Yushchenko, Ukraine’s opposition presidential
candidate, have continued to protest against alleged fraud in Sunday’s
election. But the country’s electoral commission has declared the
official candidate, Viktor Yanukovich, the winner. What happens now
is unclear.

HUGE protests continued in Ukraine’s capital, Kiev, for a third day on
Wednesday November 24th, after a deeply flawed presidential election
which the opposition leader, Viktor Yushchenko, says he would have
won but for widespread balloting fraud by supporters of the official
candidate, Viktor Yanukovich. Thousands of Mr Yushchenko’s supporters,
dressed in orange, his campaign colour, continued to chant his name
in the main square, while hundreds of Mr Yanukovich’s backers, and
riot police, surrounded the electoral commission’s headquarters. The
commission rejected demands by opposition parliamentarians to
delay announcing the results until the irregularities had been
investigated. It declared Mr Yanukovich the winner, by three percentage
points – whereas exit polls had predicted a clear victory for Mr
Yushchenko. The immediate questions now are whether the opposition can
maintain the momentum of its protests; and whether they will continue
to be peaceful – or if bloody clashes with the security forces and
the official candidate’s supporters will now follow.

In an inconclusive emergency session of the parliament on Tuesday,
Mr Yushchenko had declared himself the rightful winner and had even
sworn the presidential oath, with his hand on a bible. Accusing Mr
Yanukovich and the outgoing president, Leonid Kuchma, of engineering
an electoral fraud, Mr Yushchenko said that, as a result, the country
was now “on the brink of civil conflict”. America, the European
Union and other international observers have strongly criticised
the irregularities in the poll, which reportedly included widespread
multiple voting using absentee ballots. Both the United States and
the EU have warned of serious consequences for their relations with
Ukraine if the irregularities are not properly investigated.

Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, has been backing Mr Yanukovich,
who favours maintaining Ukraine’s traditional ties to Moscow,
whereas Mr Yushchenko is keen on joining the EU and NATO. At first,
Mr Putin rang his candidate to congratulate him on his “victory” but,
as the protests of the opposition and of the western powers grew, he
backtracked and called on both candidates to act within the law. Mr
Kuchma stayed silent until Tuesday night, when he issued a statement
calling for talks between the two sides.

The eventual outcome remains uncertain. Mr Yushchenko’s supporters
are hoping for something like the non-violent “rose revolution”
a year ago in Georgia, another former Soviet state, in which huge
popular demonstrations forced the country’s then president, Edward
Shevardnadze, to resign following dubious parliamentary elections. Mr
Yanukovich and his supporters, in turn, show no sign of backing down.
However, on Wednesday Mr Yushchenko hinted at a possible compromise,
saying that he would be prepared to stand again in a re-run of the
second round of voting between him and Mr Yanukovich.

What happens now depends on several factors. First, the strength
of ordinary Ukrainians’ feelings about the outcome – how sick they
are of the current regime and the business oligarchs who prop it up,
and how far they are prepared to go to defend Mr Yushchenko’s claims
of victory. There has been talk of a general strike and the local
authorities in Kiev and several other large cities have declared
their refusal to recognise the official results. But Ukraine is in
the middle of its bitter winter – so staying on the streets will
demand great fortitude.

The loyalty of the state bureaucracy (which recently received a big
pay rise from Mr Yanukovich, currently the country’s prime minister)
may also influence events: a number of Ukrainian diplomats around the
world have signed a document denouncing the results. In particular, it
is not yet clear how the security forces will react to the protests. On
Monday, they issued a statement promising that any lawlessness would
be put down “quickly and firmly”. But in Georgia’s revolution last
year, Mr Shevardnadze bowed to the inevitable and stepped down after
it had begun to look doubtful if his security forces would obey any
order to crush the rising pro-democracy protests. It was reported
that a mid-ranking officer in an elite Ukrainian riot-police unit
had been sacked after denouncing his superiors for issuing “illegal”
orders to use force against protesters. Meanwhile, the defence minister
has denied rumours that he sent tanks to Kiev, and asked the army to
stay calm.

International pressure may also have a significant effect on the
outcome. As well as the pressure from America and the EU, a key
determining factor will be the attitude of Mr Putin. The crisis in
Ukraine is bound to overshadow his summit with EU leaders this week
(see article) and he risks serious difficulties in his relations with
both Europe and America if he backs Mr Yanukovich in repressing the
protests. Towards the climax of the Georgian revolution last year,
Mr Putin seemed to lose patience with Mr Shevardnadze, perhaps
contributing to his downfall. Does the Russian leader’s even-handed
call for both candidates in Ukraine’s conflict to obey the law suggest
he has already begun to hedge his bets?

All along, both Russia and the West have been taking a close interest
in Ukraine’s election, not just because it is one of eastern Europe’s
largest countries, with 49m people, but because the outcome could
have important consequences for the whole region. Mr Yushchenko
presented himself as a pro-western, free-market reformer who would
clean up corruption and enforce the rule of law. Mr Yanukovich, in
contrast, stood for deepening Ukraine’s close links with Russia. If
Mr Yushchenko had gained the presidency and led Ukraine towards
becoming a westernised democracy with European-style prosperity,
voters in Russia and elsewhere in eastern Europe might have begun to
demand the same. Thus a win by Mr Yushchenko would have been a huge
blow to Mr Putin, whose attempts to exert control over former Soviet
states would be greatly diminished.

Though Mr Yushchenko is now hoping for a Georgian-style bloodless
revolution to deliver him the presidency, there are also some less
promising precedents among the former Soviet states: only two months
ago, Belarus’s president, Alexander Lukashenka, “won” a rigged
referendum to allow him to run for re-election. The EU decided this
week to tighten its sanctions against those in his government it
blames for the “fraudulent” ballot. But so far there is no sign that
Mr Lukashenka will be dislodged from power. Azerbaijan and Armenia
also held flawed elections last year: in Azerbaijan, there were
riots after the son of the incumbent president won amid widespread
intimidation and bribery, but these were violently put down; and
in Armenia, voters reacted with quiet despair at the re-election of
their president amid reports of ballot-stuffing. If Ukraine follows
these precedents, hopes for change there, and in other parts of the
former Soviet Union, may be dashed.