Big News Out of the Ukraine

A stolen election? You bet. What will the "democratic" European powers do? Nothing. Where is the American Left? Nowhere to be found. What will the U.S. government do? We'll see.

Thousands of opposition demonstrators braved freezing temperatures for a third straight day as tensions mounted in Ukraine's election crisis.

Officials are set to announce final results in the disputed presidential poll on Wednesday.
Ukraine's outgoing president offered to hold talks to end the crisis, but an ally of presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko said the only thing to discuss was a transfer of power to the opposition leader.

"We are ready to negotiate only about the peaceful handing over of power to Yushchenko," Mykola Tomenko said.

...Yushchenko, a pro-Western liberal, and Yanukovych, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, fought a bitterly contested runoff battle.

On Monday, the election commission said that with 99.38 percent of precincts counted, Yanukovych had 49.42 percent to Yushchenko's 46.70 percent.

However, an exit poll conducted under a Western-funded program gave Yushchenko 54 percent of the vote to Yanukovych's 43 percent. Another poll put Yushchenko ahead by 49.4 to 45.9 percent.

Western obersvers criticized the balloting, and on Wednesday European leaders stepped up pressure on Ukraine to review the results. (Full story)

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, normally a close ally of Putin, said the election showed what he called massive fraud, Reuters reported, while EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said Ukraine was at a crossroads and could turn violent.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso warned of "consequences" for the EU's political and trade relations with Ukraine if the government there does not allow a full review of the election results, AP reported.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer summoned the Ukraine ambassador Wednesday to express the alliance's disappointment, and Ukraine's ambassador to the European Union was called to appear before the European Parliament on Wednesday to defend the election, AP reported.

At the Vatican, Pope John Paul II told Ukrainian pilgrims he was praying for their country in a "special way."

And in Washington, the White House issued a statement saying the United States is "deeply disturbed by extensive and credible indications of fraud committed in the Ukrainian presidential election."