The United States on Thursday reiterated its call that the political crisis in Ukraine should be "quickly and fairly" settled down.
"Our view has been and remains that the turmoil needs to be ended quickly and fairly in order to get past the problems caused by the fraud of the November 21st vote, that this needs to proceed through legal and political processes of Ukraine," the State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.
"We're very pleased that the round table negotiations were productive and that the parties made pledges yesterday to refrain from the use of force and they affirmed again their support for Ukraine's territorial integrity.
"We thank the president of Poland, the president of Lithuania and others, EU Foreign Affairs Chief Solana, as well as the Russian Duma chief, who was there as part of this group, for their contributions to the negotiating process," Boucher said.
Referring to Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma's short visit to Moscow on Thursday, Boucher noted that "everybody's effort needs to be focused on how to help the people of Ukraine use these various legal and political processes to achieve an outcome that reflects their will, not the will of any outside party."
It was reported that Kuchma and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin have agreed to favor an entire new election instead of a revote for the second round of election.
Kuchma, who supported the pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovich, proposed holding an entirely new presidential election, not just a re-run of the disputed second round.
Putin sent a congratulatory message to Yanukovich on his election and repeatedly accused the West of stoking tension in the former Soviet republic.
US President George W. Bush said Thursday that forthcoming presidential elections in Ukraine should be free from foreign influence.
"I think any election -- if there is one -- ought to be free from any foreign influence...The position of our government is that the will of the people must be known and heard," Bush said, adding any new elections in Ukraine must be "open and fair"
Ukraine has been in a political crisis since the November 21 presidential election, victory in which has been claimed by both pro-Moscow candidate, Prime Minister Yanukovich, and pro-Western candidate, opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko.
The United States and the European Union have backed Ukraine's opposition and have refused to recognize the election result as legal.
The Ukrainian congress voted to pass a resolution Saturday, announcing that the second round of the fourth Ukraine presidential election is of no legal effect.
Ukraine appears to be headed toward holding a new election after the Supreme Court rules on the fraud accusations.