Orange Revolution

In late 2004 seventeen days of peaceful protest in Kiev forced a rerun of Ukraine falsified presidential election and a change of power.

Overview

The 21 November 2004 runoff between Viktor Yushchenko and the incumbent prime minister Viktor Yanukovych was stolen by systematic fraud, months after Yushchenko himself was disfigured by dioxin poisoning. Hundreds of thousands filled Kiev Independence Square through freezing weather, sustained by tents, kitchens, and discipline. International mediation, a Supreme Court ruling voiding the runoff, and defections in parliament forced the 26 December rerun, which Yushchenko won. The revolution exposed the regional fault lines of Ukraine without resolving state capture and oligarchic power. Its leaders quarreled, and Yanukovych returned to power through later elections, a cycle that closed only with the uprising of 2014. The Orange Revolution showed both the power and the fragility of electoral protest.