Epress.am News from Armenia
The political clashes that have engulfed the Georgian breakaway province of South Ossetia after election results were annulled earlier this week continue. The South Ossetian Supreme Court charged opposition candidate Alla Dzhioyeva with vague electoral violations and prohibited her from standing in a repeat presidential election rescheduled for March 25, 2012.
Dzhioyeva — an anti-corruption crusader and former education minister — had an almost insurmountable 17 point lead over her rival, based on results from 74 of 85 precincts. She declared victory on Wednesday and announced that unless the Supreme Court accepts her appeal, the current government “will be [held] responsible for further developments,” writes Daniel Vajdic in The Corner, a blog of National Review Online.
In addition, she charged that the thousands of her supporters who have Russian citizenship will boycott the parliamentary elections in Russia on Dec. 4, reports Newsru.com.
South Ossetia’s acting president Eduard Kokoity has said, however, he is not opposed to the opposition representative’s participation in next year’s elections.
But Dzhioyeva says she won’t be participating in the new elections and continues to demand the Supreme Court ruling be abolished and she to be recognized as the lawful president of the republic. Meanwhile, international observers have told Russian journalists about the strange circumstances surrounding the annulment of the election results — on election day, none of the candidates made any statements about violations, and complaints from the Kremlin and the Unity party candidate surfaced only after it became known that Dzhioyeva had secured the most votes.
Protest demonstrations and rallies continue in the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali.
