Ex-chief of local KGB Leonid Tibilov has been declared by the electoral commission in breakaway South Ossetia as winner of the Sunday’s presidential runoff.
The breakaway region’s central election commission said on Monday morning that Tibilov received 15,786 votes, or 54.12%.
David Sanakoev, the breakaway region’s special envoy for human rights, received 12,439 votes, or 42.65%, the local news agency, RES, reported.
Sanakoev has congratulated Tibilov on victory and announced about the plans to establish a new political party.
Leonid Tibilov became South Ossetia’s third leader since the region broke away from Georgia in early 1990s.
He was head of the breakaway region’s state security committee (KGB) in 1990s and became involved in the work of Joint Control Commission, now defunct negotiating body with the Georgian side, from 1999.
He was chairman of board of directors of a local bank in Tskhinvali in 2007-2009. His most recent official post was a consultant to the South Ossetian leader’s special envoy for post-conflict issues.
The Sunday’s second round was held two weeks after the first round of repeat presidential poll on March 25, which came five months after results of a runoff in November, in which an opposition candidate Alla Jioyeva won, were annulled.
Elections in the breakaway region are denounced as illegitimate by Tbilisi and the international community, except of Russia and few other countries, which have recognized South Ossetia and Georgia’s another breakaway region of Abkhazia.
“Not a single act in that territory can be considered as legal as long as this territory remains occupied and as long as people are not allowed to return back to their homes,” Nino Kalandadze, Georgia’s deputy foreign minister, said on April 9.
“After Russia’s total failure in the first attempt [in November] to install its favorite candidate, it seems they prepared much better for [the repeat polls],” Davit Bakradze, the Georgian parliamentary chairman, said on April 9.