The Central Election Commission announced in Kyiv that opposition candidate Viktor Yuschenko was the official winner in Ukraine's repeat presidential vote on 26 December

A reformist widely regarded as pro-Western by pundits at home and abroad, Yushchenko defeated Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych 51.99 percent to 44.19 percent, Reuters and Interfax news agency reported. Ballots were reportedly cast against both candidates by 2.34 percent of voters. Yanukovych vowed last night to mount a legal challenge to the results of the election as returns showed his reformist opponent with an insurmountable lead. "I will never recognize this defeat because there were violations of the constitution and of human rights in our country," Yanukovych said last night. Yanukovych stressed that he has not urged his supporters to mount public demonstrations, AP reported. The Yanukovych campaign team has collected almost 5,000 complaints so far concerning the fairness of the balloting, the prime minister told reporters. Yanukovych criticized election-law reforms passed between the abortive runoff and the 26 December vote that restricted home voting, which was blamed for some of the fraud that marred the November vote. That restriction was nullified by the Constitutional Court on the eve of the ballot. Candidates have seven days to appeal from the release of the final preliminary tally.