Ukraine president-elect calls for premier resignation

Source: PressTV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=118350§ionid=351020606


Ukraine's President-elect Viktor Yanukovich has asked defeated candidate Yulia Tymoshenko to resign as prime minister and abandon her protests.

Tymoshenko's camp has announced that it is determined to challenge the results of Sunday's vote in court, and seeks a recount of votes in certain places.

This is while international observers say that the election was completely free and fair. Ukrains electoral commission has announced Yanukovich as the winner of the run-off to the country's presidential election by a margin of 3.48 percent.

"I call on the prime minister to resign and go into opposition," Yanukovich said in a statement posted on the website of his Party of the Regions.

"I want to remind Mrs. Tymoshenko that the basis of democracy is the will of the people. Democratic leaders always accept the results of the elections. The country does not need a new crisis," he added.

Tymoshenko has so far refused to concede defeat and had threatened to organize mass street rallies, should any evidence of rigging emerge, but Yanukovich maintains that his rival should accept his narrow victory.

Analysts believe that another round of street protests against the results of the presidential election would be a reminiscent of the 2004 Orange Revolution, which was a result of fraud allegations in the November 2004 election in which Yanukovich was running against outgoing President and then presidential hopeful Viktor Yushchenko.