Paris, 1 December – The Assembly, which on Wednesday called for a compromise in Ukraine, urged all the parties to “continue to abstain from the use of force” and to “prevent any partition” of the country” during an emergency debate in which a number of speakers asked for a new election to be held.
 
Opening this debate and speaking on behalf of the Political Committee, Stef Goris (Belgium, Liberal Group) said the government of Ukraine had to understand that the people should be able to make a democratic choice about who they wanted as President in a third round of the election. In a resolution adopted at the end of the debate, the Assembly considers that “there are reasons for serious doubts as to whether the official results fully reflect the will of the Ukrainian electorate”, having noted that according to the International Election Observation Mission (IEOM), “the state executive authorities and the Central Election Commission displayed a lack of will to conduct a genuine democratic election process”.
 
The Assembly urgently called on the Ukrainian authorities to review, together with the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), electoral law and the election process and requested all the parties involved to “do everything in their power to redress the consequences of the alleged irregularities which took place in the presidential election”.
 
The Assembly also expressed support for the efforts being made by the international community and in particular by Javier Solana, the WEU Secretary-General and EU High Representative for the CFSP, to “convince the different parties in Ukraine that a compromise should be reached with a view to the government considering which reforms are needed to maintain Ukraine as a viable and democratic country”.