Ukraine's Election Crisis

Reuters reports that signs of compromise emerge in Ukraine. If true, it is none too soon:

Ukraine's political crisis is appearing to ease with both presidential candidates in a disputed election offering ways out of their bitter feud that has taken the country to the brink of violent conflict.

Before Ukrainian authorities formally declared Moscow-backed Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich was the winner, both Yushchenko and Yanukovich made statements easing the crisis.

First Yushchenko, said he is open to a rerun of the vote that showed he lost to the prime minister. Then Yanukovich hinted that he too was open to compromise saying he was not interested in official results that handed him a fake victory.

"I need no fictitious victory, a result which could lead to violence and victims. No position of authority, no matter how important, is worth a single human life."

Thank goodness the grownups showed up.

Shortly before Yanukovich was declared the winner Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder urged Ukraine to solve its political crisis through legal means.

That came after European Union threatened that there would be economic consequences for Ukraine if Ukraine does not review the disputed elections.

Ukraine's Supreme Court rejected Yushchenko's complaint about election irregularities. That development seem to douse hope of a peaceful resolution.

Earlier today things looked grim. Mass protests have been ongoing in Kiev for three days. There were reports of plans to use force, prompting Ukrainian Defense Minister Kuzmuk to say there would be no movement of troops because of the unrest and appealing to the army to keep calm.

Ukraine is deeply divided along ethnic, geographic, and historical lines. According to MSNBC election results split the country along territorial lines, with the north and west largely supporting Yushchenko while the south and east backed Yanukovych.

An estimated 20 percent of Ukraine's 47 million population are ethnic Russians. Ukraine, which was first absorbed by Russia in the 18th century was the second-most important Soviet Union after Russia, and remains heavily dependent on Russia for energy.

Western and Northern Ukraine lean more toward Europe and the West, like Yushchenko.

Ukraine's geographic situation makes the situation all the more dangerous. The New York Times reported about Ukraine's election crisis in cold war terms, calling the situation a "cold-war-style proxy confrontation:"

Not since NATO's war in Kosovo, or perhaps the cold war itself, have the political differences between Russia and the West appeared so starkly as they have in Ukraine's disputed presidential election.

It is not just that Russia and President Vladimir V. Putin himself have come out so strongly for the candidate promising closer relations with Moscow, Viktor F. Yanukovich, while Europe and the United States are supporting Viktor A. Yushchenko, albeit more subtly.

It is that both sides - rivals in what the United Financial Group, a Moscow investment banking company, calls "a cold-war-style proxy confrontation" - have staked out diametrically opposed views of what unfolded in Ukraine.

Mr. Putin, through a Kremlin spokesman, called "open and honest" an election that the European Union, the United States and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe called everything but that.

The Washington Post saw the U.S. engaged in a balancing act seeking to support Ukrainian demonstrators without risking an open break with Russian President Vladimir Putin:

"This is not a U.S.-Russia issue," an administration official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of sensitive diplomacy. "It is not an East-West issue." He said that a fully democratic Ukraine would have to have close relations with Russia, no matter who wins the presidency.

I often wonder if it wouldn’t be better if Condoleezza Rice was a China expert. But at times like these, it's good to have a National Security Advisor and Secretary of State designate who is recognized as a Russia expert.

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