Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists meant it was the only far-right party to participate. In autumn 2009, Svoboda joined the Alliance of European National Movements as the only organisation from outside the European Union. That year the party claimed to have 15,000 members. 2009 Electoral breakthrough The party's electoral breakthrough was the 2009 Ternopil Oblast local election when they obtained 34.69% of the votes and 50 seats out of 120 in the Ternopil Oblast Council. This was the best result for a far-right party in Ukraine's history. Tyahnybok's candidacy in the 2010 presidential election did not build on the 2009 Ternopil success. Tyahnybok received 1.43% of the vote. Most of his votes he gained in Lviv oblast, Ternopil Oblast and Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast accounted to 5% of the vote. In the second round, Tyahnybok did not endorse a candidate. He did present a list of some 20 demands for second round candidate Yulia Tymoshenko had to fulfil first before gaining his endorsement—which included publicizing alleged secret deals Tymoshenko had with Vladimir Putin and ridding herself of what he called Ukraine-haters in her close circles. During the 2010 Ukrainian local elections the party won between 20 and 30% of the votes in Eastern Galicia, where it became one of the main forces in local government. The 2009 provincial elections in Ternopil had previously been the greatest success of the Svoboda party, when it won 34.4 per cent of votes cast. During the 2010 Ukrainian local elections, Svoboda surpassed this figure, accounting for 5.2% of the vote nationwide. Analysts explained Svoboda's victory in Galicia during the 2010 elections as a result of the policies of the Azarov Government, who were seen as too pro-Russian by the electorate. According to Andreas Umland, Senior Lecturer in Political Science at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Svoboda's increasing exposure in the Ukrainian media has contributed to its recent successes. Between 2004 and 2010 party membership increased threefold to 15,000 members (traditionally party membership is low in Ukraine As of 2011 Svoboda had factions in eight of Ukraine's 25 regional councils, and in three of those Svoboda is the biggest faction. Reportedly, the members and supporters of Svoboda are predominantly young people. Several clergymen of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyivan Patriarchate, Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church are Svoboda members and have stood for election as Svoboda candidates. According to the party, they