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BBC
Members of Yulia Tymoshenko's bloc say they will contest in court the conduct of Ukraine's presidential vote after her apparent defeat, media reports say.
One official said it would contest results in some areas and seek recounts while another reportedly accused Viktor Yanukovych's party of "falsification".
Mrs Tymoshenko has not spoken in public but reportedly told allies she would "never" accept Mr Yanukovych's win.
However, foreign monitors have said the election was free and fair.
Observers from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) were unusually blunt, warning the country's political leaders they should listen to the people's verdict and make sure the transition of power was peaceful, the BBC's Richard Galpin reports from the Ukrainian capital, Kiev.
With more than 99% of votes counted after Sunday's poll, Mr Yanukovych was estimated to be ahead on some 48.83% of the vote, while Mrs Tymoshenko had around 45.59%.
Yanukovych supporters have been gathering in Kiev in anticipation of the announcement of the full election results.
His discredited victory in the 2004 presidential election, which was marred by widespread fraud, sparked the Orange Revolution, led by Mrs Tymoshenko's former ally, Viktor Yushchenko.
The latter was elected president when the vote was re-run but his popularity quickly declined and he was eliminated from the first round of this year's election.
Ukraine faces serious economic problems as well as internal divisions over whether to look to the EU and Nato, or Russia.
'Cynical violation'
Olena Shustik, a deputy leader of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, said it would "challenge the results at certain polling stations and seek a recount at those stations".
"If the result in the courts is positive, we will question the overall result of the elections," she added, according to the Interfax-Ukraine news agency.
About 1,000 polling-stations are believed to be in question.
In a statement published earlier on the bloc's website, Ms Shustik said the vote in eastern and southern Ukraine had been "distorted because of fraud".
In Ukraine's parliament, bloc member Serhiy Sobolev was quoted by Reuters news agency as telling MPs: "Voting day displayed a cynical violation of Ukrainian law by the teams of Yanukovych, pressure on the electors and a broad arsenal of falsification by the Regions Party [of Viktor Yanukovych].
"Consequently, the Tymoshenko bloc announces that we will defend in the courts our right, and the rights of our citizens, to honest and transparent elections.
"We will do everything to prove that this election was falsified," he said, according to AFP news agency.
"We will prepare appeals to the courts in the next days."
Ukraine's Ukrainska Pravda daily quoted Mrs Tymoshenko as telling her party at a private meeting on Monday: "I will never recognise the legitimacy of Yanukovych's victory with such elections."
She had, the paper said, instructed her lawyers to prepare to contest the electoral results in court.
However, the paper added that some members of her bloc disagreed with her, calling instead for her to acknowledge defeat, step down as prime minister and move into opposition.
Praise for ballot
International monitors described the election as an impressive display of democracy.
The OSCE's head of mission, Joao Soares, said Ukraine's electoral commission had been transparent and unbiased.
EU foreign affairs chief, Baroness Ashton, said the EU was ready to work with the new president. Mr Yanukovych is seen by analysts as being closer to Moscow than Brussels.
"The European Union remains committed to deepening the relationship with Ukraine and supporting it in implementing its reform agenda," she said.
"It looks forward to working with the new president to this end."
The Russian ambassador to Ukraine, Mikhail Zurabov, said he expected Russian-Ukrainian relations to improve whoever assumed the presidency.
"One can mention dozens of projects which could long since have been implemented for the benefit of the two countries, but which either have not received any attention or have been stopped over the past five years," he said, referring to Mr Yushchenko's tenure.
"I think that now there will be such a reset," the Russian ambassador to Ukraine said.
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9 February 2010:
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