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FM AMEMBASSY KYIV
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INFO RUEHZG/NATO EU COLLECTIVE
RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 KYIV 000240 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/16/2020 
TAGS: PGOV PREL UP
SUBJECT: TYMOSHENKO CHALLENGES RESULTS OF ELECTION IN COURT 
 
REF: KYIV 235 
 
Classified By: Ambassador John F. Tefft for reasons 1.4 (b/d). 
 
Summary 
------- 
 
¶1. (C)  PM Tymoshenko announced February 13 that she would 
challenge in court as fraudulent the results of the February 
7 second round of the Presidential election.  Her chances to 
overturn the results are poor.  Rather, the court filing, 
which Tymoshenko made in person February 16, appears 
primarily political: an effort to de-legitimize Yanukovych. 
The Central Election Commission (CEC) certified Yanukovych as 
winner on February 14.  OSCE/ODIHR's observation mission to 
Ukraine maintains that Tymoshenko's cases lack evidence.  The 
Rada voted on February 16 to hold the inauguration on 
February 25.  The High Administrative court is expected to 
rule on the Tymoshenko campaign's allegations of fraud 
February 18.  Tymoshenko's prospects for appealing a negative 
decision are not promising.  The head of Yanukovych's 
election campaign told the Ambassador he does not expect 
Party of Regions to be able to take down the Tymoshenko-led 
coalition until after Yanukovych's inauguration, when 
Yanukovych will have more leverage.   End Summary. 
 
The Braided Lady Refuses to Sing 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (C)  Although we heard from various sources close to PM 
Yuliya Tymoshenko that she would concede the election after 
the Central Election Commission (CEC) announced its final 
results (reftel), Tymoshenko appeared on television on the 
evening of February 13, prior to the CEC's February 14 
certification, to announce that she planned to challenge the 
February 7 presidential runoff results in court.  During her 
speech she said that Party of Regions (Regions) candidate 
Viktor Yanukovych would "never be the legitimately elected 
President of Ukraine."  Tymoshenko also claimed that she had 
clear proof that Regions had falsified between three to eight 
percent of the vote in the Crimean region and that more than 
one million votes "may have been falsified using various 
techniques" throughout Ukraine.  Most troubling was her 
declaration that "individual OSCE observers" have expressed 
their willingness to appear in court with video footage and 
assessments that there was systematic fraud. 
 
Tymoshenko Campaign "Stonewalling" ODIHR 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶3. (C)  OSCE/ODIHR officials called Tymoshenko's statements 
of OSCE's support for her case "unfortunate" and baseless as 
far as they know.  Ambassador Heidi Tagliavini, head of the 
OSCE/ODIHR election monitoring mission, tried three times to 
talk to Deputy PM Hrihoriy Nemirya on the phone after 
Tymoshenko's statement, but he was "too busy" to take her 
calls, ODIHR's senior legal analyst told us.  Tymoshenko's 
campaign has ignored requests by ODIHR, including a letter 
from Ambassador Tagliavini, to see the evidence Tymoshenko 
and her legal team have been alluding to in their public 
statements.  ODIHR officials tell us they have been 
completely "stonewalled" by Tymoshenko's team since they 
characterized the election on February 8 as fundamentally 
meeting international standards. 
 
Legal Argument "Clever" But Insufficient 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶4. (C)  ODIHR's legal analyst conceded that Tymoshenko's 
legal argument is "clever," but added that in his opinion 
there is insufficient evidence for her to win her challenge 
at the High Administrative Court (HAC).  Tymoshenko went in 
person to file the case on February 16.  Thus far 
Tymoshenko's legal team has filed 46 challenges in the Kyiv 
Administrative Court of Appeals, citing the CEC's failure to 
consider complaints filed by Tymoshenko's "Batkivshchyna" 
(Motherland) party that certain District Election Commissions 
(DECs) refused to recount votes at some polling stations 
where Batkivshchyna allegedly witnessed fraud.  According to 
ODIHR, the courts ruled in previous cases prior to the 
February 7 runoff that the CEC does not have the right "not 
to act," and thus these challenges make legal sense because 
Tymoshenko's team is not challenging the overall results of 
the election but rather the legality of the CEC's failure to 
rule on fraud cases prior to its certification of the 
election results. 
 
¶5. (C) Tymoshenko's complaint at the HAC will consolidate 
these 46 complaints into one and ask the HAC to rule on the 
presence of fraud in these cases in the place of the CEC. 
Tymoshenko's team hopes that the HAC will decide to throw out 
the results in these cases, but ODIHR officials tell us that 
 
KYIV 00000240  002 OF 003 
 
 
they do not believe this will work.  The HAC has two days 
from the filing of the complaint to make a decision, which 
would be February 18 (since the complaint was filed on 
February 16).  The Presidential Election Law renders HAC 
decisions "unappealable."  Tymoshenko's final step, ODIHR 
tells us, would be to make an argument that because voters 
were treated differently by certain DECs, constitutional 
rights were violated and thus the process of the election is 
unconstitutional and should be considered by the 
Constitutional Court of Ukraine (CCU).  This argument would 
be very difficult to make successfully, ODIHR officials add. 
Tymoshenko may struggle to get an appeal heard in the 
Constitutional Court given CCU Chairman Stryzhak's public 
statement on February 15 that there are no legal grounds to 
challenge the validity of the election results in any court. 
 
Unlike 2004, Exit Polls, PVT & CEC Results Agree 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
 
¶6. (SBU)  Unlike in 2004, when exit polls indicated that 
Viktor Yushchenko had won the second round while the official 
results declared Yanukovych the winner, the results of every 
published exit poll, local NGO OPORA's parallel vote 
tabulation (PVT) and the official certified results from the 
CEC all indicate that Yanukovych won.  The results of the 
various exit polls, the PVT and those certified by the CEC 
are as follows: 
 
  Democratic Initiatives Foundation (partially funded by NED) 
     -- Yanukovych     48.7% 
     -- Tymoshenko     45.5% 
     -- Against All     5.5% 
 
  Inter Television (Two Polls) 
    SOCIS (Ukrainian Independent Polling Organization) 
     -- Yanukovych     49.5% 
     -- Tymoshenko     44.5% 
     -- Against All     6.0% 
 
  Ukrainian Sociology Service (USS) and FOM-Ukraine 
     -- Yanukovych     49.7% 
     -- Tymoshenko     44.6% 
     -- Against All     5.6% 
 
  ICTV Poll (Run by British Polling Firm GfK) 
     -- Yanukovych     49.8% 
     -- Tymoshenko     45.2% 
     -- Against All     5.0% 
 
  "Shuster Live" Political Talk Show 
     -- Yanukovych     48.7% 
     -- Tymoshenko     45.6% 
     -- Against All     5.7% 
 
  "National Exit Poll" ( Run by KIIS, and Razumkov Center) 
     -- Yanukovych     48.4% 
     -- Tymoshenko     45.7% 
     -- Against All     5.7% 
 
  OPORA PVT 
     -- Yanukovych     49.6% 
     -- Tymoshenko     45.9% 
     -- Against All     4.5% 
 
  Official CEC Certified Results 
     -- Yanukovych     48.95% 
     -- Tymoshenko     45.47% 
     -- Against All     4.36% 
 
The unanimous results of these independent polls further 
weaken arguments by Tymoshenko's team that Yanukovych's 
campaign used systematic fraud in order to win the runoff 
election. 
 
Rada Approves February 25 Inauguration Date 
------------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (U)  Tymoshenko's public statements and court challenges 
did not deter Parliament (Rada) from voting on February 16 
to hold Yanukovych's inauguration on February 25.  238 MPs 
from Regions (172), Our Ukraine - Peoples Self Defense (15), 
Communists (27), Bloc Lytvyn (20), Bloc Yuliya Tymoshenko 
(1), and nonaligned (3) approved the date. 
 
Senior Tymoshenko Advisor Pessimistic 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶8. (C) Deputy Justice Minister (and a Tymoshenko campaign 
legal advisor) Yevhen Kornyichuk told us February 15 that 
Tymoshenko's chances to overturn the election result were 
next to none.   He had just left a Cabinet of Ministers 
meeting with her and described her as in the "most depressed 
 
KYIV 00000240  003 OF 003 
 
 
state" he had ever seen.   She had not yet come to grips with 
her defeat.  Tymoshenko had been silent until February 13, he 
said, because she had no "Plan B."  Tymoshenko's lawyers were 
divided about proceeding with the court cases but she 
insisted on going forward fundamentally for political 
reasons.  She wants to delegitimize Yanukovych's victory and 
be able to claim to her base that she was not defeated.  She 
is, he said, hung up on 2004 analogies -- which do not apply. 
 
 
¶9. (C) Korniychuk said that the Supreme Court had made clear 
it would not take an appeal.  He also highlighted that the 
Constitutional Court Chairman had also said he did not see 
grounds to hear an appeal if Tymoshenko loses.  Korniychuk 
recommended that Tymoshenko not be too strident in the event 
the court rules against her; there is a chance, he said, that 
she will berate the court as a fraud and in Regions' pocket. 
He noted that the legal challenges may be fully concluded as 
early as February 18.   He predicted that, if by some miracle 
the court voids the election and there is a third round, 
popular outrage would ensure that Tymoshenko would lose - and 
by more than in the second round. 
 
Coalition Talks 
--------------- 
 
¶10. (C) Ambassador met February 16 with Mykola Azarov, head 
of Yanukovych's campaign.  Azarov was "as confident as one 
can be in Ukraine" that Yanukovych's inauguration would take 
place on February 25.  He said it was far more difficult for 
Regions to form a new coalition than it was to fight 
Tymoshenko's fraud allegations.  Regions would do everything 
it could to form a new coalition and avoid early 
parliamentary elections.  He predicted that there would be no 
new coalition until after the inauguration, when Yanukovych 
would be in a stronger position to negotiate.  He expects a 
new coalition to form within a week of the inauguration. 
 
¶11.  (C) Azarov complained how difficult it was to negotiate 
with the amorphous Our Ukraine - People's Self Defense 
(OU-PSD) bloc.  Yanukovych's condition to coalition partners 
was that the coalition remain for two years.  If they can't 
agree to that, Yanukovych would have to opt for early 
parliamentary elections.   This would be unfortunate, Azarov 
said, since another four months in campaign mode could bring 
the economy to full collapse.  As for the Prime Minister in a 
new coalition, Azarov did not assert, as he had previously, 
that it would be he.  Rather, he suggested that the 
Ambassador "ask Yanukovych," implying that his chances had 
slipped. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶12.  (C)  If the High Administrative Court rules according to 
the election law, it could dispose of the Tymoshenko 
campaign's allegations of electoral fraud for good as early 
as February 18.  There is thus a reasonable chance that 
Yanukovych's inauguration will take place on February 25 as 
scheduled.  Tymoshenko appears intent on hanging on to her 
post for as long as she can.  Regions, as Azarov noted, 
continues to have its work cut out in trying to get OU-PSD to 
defect and thus take down the Tymoshenko-led coalition.  If 
this effort fails, the prospect of divided (Yanukovych vs. 
Tymoshenko) government and/or early parliamentary elections 
looms. 
TEFFT