Brussels, February 9 (Interfax-Ukraine) - A monitoring delegation of eight members of the European Parliament have confirmed that both rounds of presidential election in Ukraine met most of the country's international commitments, the delegates said in a press release issued on Monday.
"The door to Europe should be open to Ukraine. Orderly elections are an important signal for European public opinion that today Ukraine is a normal European country that has the right to make its European choice. I hope that this choice will be supported by the signing of the Association Agreement and the relaxation of visa requirements. I will be pursuing these goals as head of the EU-Ukraine delegation," said the delegation head and chairman of the EU-Ukraine Parliamentary Cooperation Committee in the European Parliament, Pawel Kowal from Poland.
He said free elections were once again held in a country that had lived through communism, World War II and Soviet domination.
Rebecca Harms, a German member of the European Parliament for Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance called on both candidates to accept the result and – in case of doubt – to let the courts decide. She also called on the Commissioner-designate for Enlargement and Neighborhood Policy Stefan Fuele, to put a special emphasis on Ukraine, and to support the democratic development in Ukraine.
Slovenia’s MEP Alojz Peterle of the Group of the European People’s Party said: "We visited 14 polling stations yesterday, both urban and rural, and were impressed with the high level of attention to rules and procedures. I think we can safely say that Ukraine has raised the level of electoral standards and can be a good example for many other countries. In addition, despite strong polarization and electoral law changes between the first and the second round of elections, the elections were conducted peacefully and no major tension was felt at the polling stations."
The EP delegation noted that the election process was carried out correctly but, any functioning democracy also needs a wider, long-term legal framework, said Romanian MEP Adina Ioana Valean from the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.
Accordingly to Bulgarian MEP of Party of European Socialists Kristian Vigenin, this election clearly showed that Ukraine is consistently moving towards political stability and maturity.
"The next step should be to restart the long postponed reforms of the country for the benefit of Ukrainians," he said.
German MEP Barbara Weiler from the same group said that it would not be possible to improve the election process in Ukraine without tackling the issue of rules for the financing of political parties and electoral campaigns.
Latvian MEP Inese Vaidere from the European People’s Party pointed out that candidates still seem to look for holes in the election law in terms of political advertising.
"We noticed many posters on the streets indirectly and clearly promoting one candidate, which Ukrainian election law prohibits," she said.
