China expressed on December 28 "respect" to the latest Ukraine's presidential election result.

"China and Ukraine are friendly countries. We have noticed the result of the second round of Ukraine's presidential election announced by the Ukrainian Central Election Commission. China respects Ukrainian people's choice," Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Liu Jianchao said at a regular press briefing.

The presidential run-off between Ukraine's presidential candidate, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych and Ukrainian opposition presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko began on Sunday with 32,118 polling stations opening at 8:00 am (0600GMT).

With 99.9 percent of the vote counted Yushchenko had secured 52.01 percent of the vote, compared with 44.18 percent for Yanukovich, according to the electoral commission.

Yushchenko claimed his victory Monday in the re-vote while his opponent Prime Minister Yanukovich refused to concede the defeat. Yanukovich also vowed to appeal to the court to the re-vote results.

It was the third time in eight weeks that the two rival candidates faced off in a fiercely waged presidential contest.

Yanukovych defeated Yushchenko by a narrow margin in the November 21 run-off. But Yushchenko supporters staged widespread demonstrations, protesting at what they called election fraud.

The results of the Nov. 21 presidential run-off were then annulled by the Supreme Court, leading to Sunday's re-vote.

Source: Xinhua