You're reading: Update: With 98.7% of ballots counted, gap between Yanukovych and Tymoshenko is 2.86%

With 98.7% of the ballots in the Ukrainian presidential run-off counted, Regions Party leader Viktor Yanukovych has garnered 48.64% of the vote, while his bitter rival Yulia Tymoshenko had 45.78%, the press center of the Ukrainian Central Election Commission (CEC) has reported.

A total of 4.38% supported neither of the candidates.

The gap between Yanukovych and Tymoshenko now stands at 2.86%.

A total of 99.11% of ballots were counted in the overseas electoral district. According to this data, Tymoshenko won 60.04%, while Yanukovych collected 34.46%. A total of 4.62% voted against both candidates.

All of the election returns from 12 regions, Kyiv and Sevastopol have been sent to the CEC.

The lowest number of protocols on the returns were received from Crimea (81%) and Luhansk region (94,60%).

The voter turnout on February 7 was 69.07%

The CEC is now receiving ballot-count documents in electronic form and has started receiving official vote returns on paper.

Yanukovych won 35.32% of the vote in the first round of the presidential election, while Tymoshenko had 25.05%. Eighteen candidates competed for the country’s top office in the first round.