Vote monitors deploy in Ukraine, Putin sees 'double standards'

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KIEV (AFP) - Western observers deployed in Ukraine to monitor a presidential vote rerun this weekend as Russian President Vladimir Putin (news - web sites) again attacked the West's role and motives in the former Soviet republic.


The candidate Putin supported in an earlier and now-discredited attempt to elect a new leader of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovich, meanwhile attacked his pro-Western opponent, Viktor Yushchenko, saying he and his supporters were paid by the West to "sell out their homeland."


Election observers from a range of Western institutions and governments including the European parliament, the NATO (news - web sites) parliamentary assembly, the Organization for Security and Cooperation (news - web sites) in Europe, the United States and others were huddling in Kiev preparing to fan out across the country.


Ukrainian officials have said that more than 12,000 people have been registered to monitor the election Sunday, a repeat of a November 21 election that sparked mass street protests, enflamed tensions between Russia and the West and was subsequently invalidated due to widespread fraud.


Laws have been changed, top election officials replaced and mass media coverage that largely favored Yanukovich in the earlier vote has now become balanced, but there were nonetheless concerns that the repeat vote could be tainted by irregularities or violence.


"There's been very, very little time to implement those changes," said Patrick Merloe, director of electoral programs for the US-based National Democratic Institute, who is in Ukraine to observe the vote.


"This country has gone through an amazing process to have an election invalidated," he said, but "at the same time, to be able to implement the reforms is not something that's easily done."


One of the changes limited home voting only to the seriously disabled. "We have a concern that these changes may well disenfranchise some legitimate voters," Merloe said.


Speaking Friday after a campaign rally in the southwest city of Vinnitsya, Yanukovich said he could "not control" talk among some of his supporters of protesting Sunday's election should Yushchenko win as many pundits forecast.


"This is not a question for me," said the 54-year-old Yanukovich, who has taken leave from his post of prime minister during the campaign.


He renewed accusations that Yushchenko and his "orange" opposition movement -- named after the theme color chosen by the candidate's campaign -- had been funded by Western governments through programs and organizations to promote democracy.


"We saw how the oranges have shown their true face," Yanukovich said. "We see how they can fight for power using foreign funds and under orders to sell out their homeland."


Western governments and institutions, the United States and the European Union (news - web sites) in particular, have denied directly funding Yushchenko. Two US congressmen however have called for an investigation into how US foreign aid funds have been used in Ukraine.


The European Union cautioned that the future of its relations with Ukraine would be determined by the conduct of the repeat election.


"The way the electoral process is conducted will set the framework for future relations between Ukraine and the EU," the bloc's foreign affairs chief, Javier Solana, said in a statement released in Brussels.


"I am confident that all sides will work to ensure that these elections are free, fair and transparent," Solana added. "The population of the country has been calling clearly and loudly for this in the past few weeks."


Russian President Vladimir Putin bridled at US and European involvement in the political situation in Ukraine, saying it smacked of hypocrisy and bias and was destabilizing there and elsewhere in the former Soviet Union.





"If you have permanent revolutions you risk plunging the post-Soviet space into endless conflict," Putin said at his annual news conference in Moscow, referring also to the so-called "rose revolution" in neighbouring Georgia in late 2003 that brought US-educated President Mikhail Saakashvili to power.

"I am worried about these double standards," Putin said.

Putin again slammed US-led plans to press ahead with elections next month in Iraq (news - web sites) and said it was the height of hypocrisy for Western governments to criticise Russia for pursuing its interests in neighbouring former Soviet republics.

"Today according to our estimates there are nine cities in Iraq where there are hostilities but they still want to carry out elections," he said, condemning European elections monitors' plans to observe the poll from Jordan as a "farce".

"We do not understand how there can be an election in a country under conditions of total occupation... It's absurd. It's a farce. Everything is upside down."

The Russian leader said it was "complete nonsense" to accuse Moscow of trying to "devour" its smaller neighbours in the former Soviet sphere of influence, referring to countries such as Georgia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan during a wide-ranging annual press conference.

He said "permanent revolutions" such as the so-called "orange revolution" of West-leaning Ukrainian opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko risked plunging the region into "endless conflict".

Even so Putin said Moscow would "respect the will of the Ukrainian people" in Sunday's election.

"We hope that the national interests triumph over the political expediency of some," he said.

"We will work with any leader in Ukraine, but we expect that in the entourage of Viktor Yushchenko there will not be people who build their political ambitions on anti-Russian slogans."

Putin has previously accused the West of pursuing neo-colonialist objectives in eastern Europe and his latest comments mark an escalation in Moscow's rhetoric against perceived Western meddling in traditional Russian affairs.

He said he would raise concerns that the United States is trying to "isolate" Russia when he meets US President George W. Bush (news - web sites) early next year.

But the Russian president otherwise praised the strength of US-Russian relations, especially in the fight against terrorism.

"The United States is one of our high priority partners. We happen to be natural partners in resolving several acute problems these days, especially combating terrorism," he said.

"I would describe our relations not as a partnership but as an alliance."