News // Politics

The apparent victory of Russia’ s preferred candidate in the Ukrainian presidential race may be a relief to Vladimir V. Putin, who has long sought to discredit his neighbor’ s raucous democracy and its drift to the West. But it comes with a catch: the election won by the candidate, Viktor F. Yanukovich, was highly competitive, unpredictable and relatively fair — just the kind of major contest that has not been held in Russia since Mr. Putin, the prime minister, consolidated power.

On Monday, for example, European election monitorspraised the election that was held Sunday, calling it an “ impressive display” of democracy. Ukraine’ s election, in other words, did not follow the Kremlin blueprint and, if anything, seemed to highlight the flaws in the system in Russia. As such, it presented a kind of alternative model for the former Soviet Union. The official tally released on Monday showed that the opposition leader, Mr. Yanukovich, defeated Prime MinisterYulia V. Tymoshenko by three percentage points, giving him a comeback from his loss in the 2004 Orange Revolution.

Ms. Tymoshenko helped spearhead the Orange Revolution, which first brought Western-style democracy to Ukraine. While her defeat might indicate a rejection of the revolution, the fact that the country carried out a contentious presidential election that was widely considered fair suggested that the Orange legacy had endured.