From RFE/RL's News Desk:
Self-proclaimed authorities in rebel-held sections of eastern Ukraine say prominent pro-Russian separatist figures have won elections denounced by the West and dismissed by President Petro Poroshenko as a "farce."
Separatist election officials said that Aleksandr Zakharchenko was elected to head the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic and that Igor Plotnitsky won about 64 percent of the vote the self-proclaimed Luhansk People's Republic, according to a full count of ballots cast on November 2.
Critics of the separatists said Zakharchenko and Plotnitsky faced no real opposition in the votes, which were held in defiance of Kyiv and the West but portrayed by Russia as a reflection of "the will of the people" in rebel-controlled portions of the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces.
EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini called the elections "illegal and illegitimate" and an "obstacle to peace" in eastern Ukraine.
From Andrew Roth in the Moscow bureau of "The New York Times":
VIDEO: Hundreds of people took to the streets of Kyiv to protest against elections in separatist-held areas of eastern Ukraine on November 2. The protesters marched from Independence Square, the locus of the revolution, chanting slogans and singing the Ukrainian national anthem. The elections have been recognized by Russia but condemned by the Ukrainian and many Western governments. (Video by RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service)
"Ukraine does not want peace, as it claims. Obviously it is playing a double game."
-- the newly elected president of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, Aleksandr Zakharchenko
From "Ukraine: Donetsk Votes For New Reality In Country That Does Not Exist" by Shaun Walker in "The Guardian":
With armed men in the polling station, no voter lists, and international observers coming from an organisation concocted the night before the vote, these were no normal elections.
But then the Donetsk People’s Republic is no normal country. It is no country at all, according to most of the world. But the vote for prime minister here and in neighbouring Luhansk region on Sunday was one more step towards creating a new reality on the ground and carving out a chunk of Ukraine that will no longer controlled by Kiev. Moscow has already said it will recognise the results.
The vote came more than six months after a handful of gunmen began taking over administrative buildings in several eastern cities. Since then, the Ukrainian army and volunteer battalions have fought a bloody war against rebels backed with Russian firepower in a conflict that has claimed well over 3,000 lives, many of them civilians.
Read the full story here.
From today's look at yesterday's vote by RFE/RL's News Desk:
Analysts said the separatist elections would only solidify the standoff between Kyiv and the separatists, giving Russia a lever of influence by setting the rebel-held regions further apart from the rest of Ukraine and potentially creating a new "frozen conflict" like those Kremlin critics say Moscow has encouraged elsewhere in the former Soviet Union to maintain clout. ...
Several other Western media outlets also reported witnessing heavy movements of troops near Donetsk.
“We also caution Russia against using any such illegitimate vote as a pretext to insert additional troops and military equipment into Ukraine,” "The Wall Street Journal" quoted Mark Stroh, a spokesman for the White House National Security Council, as saying.
Read the full story here.