Yanukovych to be sworn in as Ukraine’s president on February 25

Ukraine’s parliament has voted to approve the swearing-in of Viktor Yanukovych on February 25 2010 as president, over the objections of the Yulia Tymoshenko camp, which boycotted the vote while Tymoshenko formally lodged court action challenging Yanukovych’s win.

Tymoshenko went to the supreme administrative court on February 16 with crates of evidence that she says backs up her allegations of vote-rigging, the Voice of America reported.

International observers have deemed the election that produced Yanukovych’s victory as in line with accepted standards, and Yanukovych already has been congratulated by the White House, the Kremlin and the European Union, among others.

Official results say that Tymoshenko lost by about 888 000 votes, while she alleges that electoral fraud deprived her of about a million votes.

Officials of Yanukovych’s Party of the Regions say that it is not possible for the court to order a repeat of the second round of presidential elections, and Tymoshenko can only challenge the conduct of the central election commission in counting the results.

Yanukovych has called more than once for Tymoshenko to step down as prime minister, a call that he repeated by saying that a defeat in court should be followed by her resignation.

Source:sofiaecho.com/