Ukraine PM drops election court challenge

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko yesterday dropped her legal challenge to her rival's presidential election victory, saying she had lost faith in the country's courts.

Her dramatic backdown after a pledge just the day before to fight till the end was the latest twist in Tymoshenko's tortuous struggle to hold on to power, and sent rivals and observers guessing what her next move will be.

Yanukovych's supporters celebrated Tymoshenko's legal defeat, gloating that nerves had failed the steely politician known for her perfect composure.

"It remains for us to prepare for February 25 when the new president will take his oath," Olexander Lavrinovich, first deputy speaker of parliament, who represented Yanukovych in the court, told reporters.

Tymoshenko said she had asked the court to drop her complaint because she did not see any sense in further proceedings.

"It has become obvious that it is not a court and it is not justice," said the flamboyant premier, wearing a grey dress, her trademark golden braid wrapped around her head.

After several hours of deliberations, judge Olexander Nechitailo said the court would leave Tymoshenko's lawsuit without consideration.

"Tymoshenko's emotional state didn't allow her to concede defeat," said Lavrinovich. "So as not to wait for what the court has to say, she said it herself in a peculiar manner."

Shortly after Tymoshenko asked the court to drop her challenge, Ukraine's outgoing president Viktor Yushchenko congratulated Yanukovych on his election, saying his main task was to heal rifts in a deeply divided country.

The hugely unpopular Yuschenko, an ally-turned-foe of Tymoshenko, expressed hope that the new president would do his best to implement his "main mission", which he said was "the consolidation of Ukraine".

Yanukovych's election presented an opportunity to bring the pro-Western, Ukrainian-speaking west and pro-Moscow, Russian-speaking east of the country closer together, Yushchenko said, according to his office.

Tymoshenko's camp, meanwhile, vowed to continue the fight against all odds.

Andriy Kozhemyakin, a top official with Tymoshenko's party, said the party would soon convene to decide on her next move but she was unlikely to turn to the courts again.

"Turning this into a show and hearing out judges' refusals does not make sense," he told AFP. "If the government is dismissed, we will work in opposition."

In parliament, Yanukovych's party has launched an official motion to throw out Tymoshenko and her government. At Tymoshenko's request, the supreme administrative court had suspended the final results handing the presidency to Yanukovych while it heard her suit claiming that the February 7 election was rigged.