In today’s international press review, we talk about the presidential elections in Ukraine.

Exit polls show that Viktor Yanukovych has won by a close margin. His victory has not been officially confirmed, yet the Russian newspaper The Gazeta openly says that his rival Yulia Tymochenko has lost.

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal paints us a portrait of the man. “His youth seems ripped from a Dickens novel”, writes the paper.

Yanukovych was an orphan, who grew up in an industrial zone, in Eastern Ukraine.

He eventually reached Ukraine’s top job in 2004, when he won the Presidential elections. Yet those were was marred with fraud, sparking the Orange Revolution.

Today, it looks like a déjà vu... His opponents accuse him of vote rigging...

The controversial election has already sparked a small protest...European media reported that four feminists demonstrated half naked outside a polling station.

In other news, the Iranian president Ahmadinejad said he would step up his nuclear enrichment program over the week-end.

The British newspaper The Guardian reports about this and says the “West is alarmed”. On the other hand, the Tehran Times reports that Ahmadinejad is still open to discussions with the international community, that has been trying to agree on a deal with Iran to enrich its uranium abroad.

And finally, the International Herald Tribune reports that Franck Sinatra’s “My way” is causing fist fights in the Philippines.
 

By Aurore Cloe DUPUIS