Ukraine’s official election results announced

Ukraine’s Central Election Commission (CEC) announced the official results of the presidential election in the country today. They were won by candidate from the Servant of the People party Vladimir Zelensky who garnered 73.22% of the vote. His rival in the runoff, Pyotr Poroshenko, secured 24.45% of the vote.

"The number of the votes cast for each presidential contender: Zelensky Vladimir Alexandrovich - 13,541,528, Poroshenko Pyotr Alexeyevich - 4,522,450. The percentage of the votes cast for each candidate in relation to the number of voters who took part in the voting: Zelensky Vladimir Alexandrovich - 73.22%, Poroshenko Pyotr Alexeyevich - 24.45%," TASS cited CEC head Tatyana Slipachuk as saying.

The results of the election were announced on the last legally designated day for counting the votes. 

Zelensky earlier accused the Central Election Commission of deliberately delaying the counting process in order to postpone the inauguration date until the period after May 27, thereby preventing him from dissolving the country’s Verkhovna Rada ahead of schedule.

First Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs Vladimir Dzhabarov, speaking to Vestnik Kavkaza, noted that Zelensky's first post-election statements on Russia do not yet allow to judge the future foreign policy of Ukraine. "The foreign policy of Ukraine will become clearer after Zelensky speeches in the near future. After he is inaugurated, a real dialogue will start, and we are ready for talks on all the sensitive issues,” he stressed.

"If Ukraine is ready to begin the process of restoring relations with us, we can only welcome it. But first we should wait for real steps from President Zelensky. Only his actions will show Ukraine's real foreign policy," the First Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs added.

Deputy director of the Institute of the CIS Vladimir Zharikhin said that judging by Vladimir Zelensky's statements, no foreign policy should be expected form him personally. "His sponsors and leaders - first of all, Kolomoisky and his team - will be engaged in foreign policy issues," the expert specified.

"Judging by the beginning of the relations between the elected president of Ukraine and Vladimir Putin, perhaps, the new leader will be taken less seriously than the old one [Petro Poroshenko - VK]. But apparently, there will be no major changes in politics, as well as in relations between Russia and Ukraine," Vladimir Zharikhin said.