… because he is too cowardly to offend Russia.

Speaking at a press conference with Russian president Vladimir Putin and German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on Tuesday, he said that “no one can contest Russia’s territorial integrity.” He added that the elections had taken place “in conditions that we cannot contest,” Interfax news agency reported.

(That was from Mosnews - sorry but I couldn’t find the original interfax article).

Mosnews goes on to report in another article that the US and EU, by contrast, did have the courage to call a spade a spade.

The US says it was “seriously flawed” and “did not meet international standards for a democratic election.”

And the EU Commission spokesman sticks his oar in with the slightly more diplomatic but still condemnatory: “We were not monitors, but we have been repeatedly told that the elections were neither free nor fair”

Who actually won the election? Does it really matter?