The second round of the presidential election in Ukraine will take place on 7 February. Viktor Yanukovich, the leader of the pro-Russian Party of the Regions who scored 35.32% at the first ballot, will compete against Yulia Timoshenko, the incumbent prime minister, who scored 25.05%. While this seems like a large gap to make up, there is still the possibility that Timoshenko may win. Everything will depend on where the votes of the unsuccessful candidates now go. In particular, Sergiy Tigipko won 13.05% and Arseniy Yatsenyuk won 6.96%.

Neither Tigipko nor Yatsenyuk has called on their voters to support either of the remaining candidates. Needless to say, though, Yanukovich and Timoshenko have courted both of them and RFE/RL is reporting the very explicit promise that Timoshenko has made to Tigipko, whereby she has offered him the premiership if she is successful. The chances are that the second round will be very close.

Meanwhile, there is a nice resume of the first round and its implications by Lucan A. Way at a University of Toronto blog on Ukraine. In addition, there are the usual array of maps and regional voting figures, which are always interesting in the Ukrainian case, at Electoral Geography.