Take your hands off Tymoshenko!

[AkMike]

Leading Ukrainian intellectuals have signed a letter urging President Viktor Yanukovych to stop persecuting Yulia Tymoshenko and other political opponents.
Ukrainian intellectuals to Yanukovych: Take your hands off Tymoshenko!
Jan 5 at 14:54
Editor’s Note: The following is an English language translation of an open letter to President Viktor Yanukovych signed and made public late in December by leading Ukrainian intellectuals. In the letter, the signees (listed below) urged Ukraine’s president to bring Ukraine back on a path towards democracy and end political oppression of oppositionists, starting with former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

On Dec. 15, 2010 democracy in Ukraine suffered a cruel blow. This is the date when political persecution reached new and dangerous heights. Democracy was trampled upon and the Party of Regions dictatorship showed its true face.

President Viktor Yanukovych’s team has showed that it continues to intimidate the opposition and civil society through repression and arrests. On Dec. 15, the Prosecutor General’s Office presented charges against Batkivshchyna Party leader Yulia Tymoshenko. By banning this politician who received 12 million votes in the presidential election from traveling abroad, the authorities have demonstrated their audacious intentions to permanently destroy the opposition and introduce authoritarian rule.

The authorities have demonstrated their audacious intentions to permanently destroy the opposition and introduce authoritarian rule.



It is clear that the accusations against the former prime minister are absurd and politically motivated.The criminal case against Yulia Tymoshenko is built on allegations that she used money from the sale of greenhouse gas emission quotas to pay pensions in the midst of the economic crisis. And despite the fact that the State Treasury confirms that all this money, down to the last kopeck, is still in these accounts, the authorities are threatening to put Tymoshenko in jail for 7-10 years.

It is understandable that Yanukovych ordered Viktor Pshonka, his crony and at the same time the Prosecutor General, to open a criminal case against Tymoshenko so as to remove the Batkivshchyna party leader from political activity and destroy the opposition. Yanukovych understands that it is Yulia Tymoshenko who will be his main competitor in future parliamentary and presidential elections, that it is Tymoshenko who personifies real resistance to anti-Ukrainian and anti-democratic policy that is being realized by the current regime.

The Ukrainian people have a bitter and tragic experience of being oppressed during the Lenin and Stalin regimes. We remember that, for the people, destroying freedom and alternatives in politics resulted in disfranchisement, poverty, famine, humiliation of dignity and spirituality and russification.

Take your hands off Yulia Tymoshenko!


Today we are on the eve of yet another era in which all that we survived in the 20th Century is starting to repeat. One party rules again. Political pressure is being put on civil society and the mass media. The opposition is being persecuted. Lawlessness and corruption are flourishing. Those in power are ceding national interests and ruining the grounds for both Ukrainian identity and independence of the state of Ukraine. A vicious attack in the parliament by lawmakers of the Party of Regions against lawmakers of the Batkivshchyna party illustrates again that members of the Party of Regions are acting as though they are occupiers of Ukrainian land.
We urge Ukraine’s President to stop political repressions, to get rid of the thugs from his inner circle, to preserve democracy and human rights in the country. We demand a stop to the political persecution of the opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko, the head of the Batkivshchyna party.

Take your hands off Yulia Tymoshenko!



Signed by:

Yuri ANDRUKHOVYCH – writer, poet;

Ivan DZYUBA – former dissident, member of the National Academy of Sciences;

Irena KARPA – writer;

Myroslav POPOVYCH – member of the National Academy of Sciences, Director, Institute of Philosophy;

Dmytro PAVLYCHKO – poet, writer;

Bohdan HORYN – former political prisoner;

Vasyl OVSIENKO - former political prisoner;

Levko LUKIANENKO – former political prisoner;

Volodymyr VASYLENKO – professor, Doctor of Law, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine;

Yuri SHCHERBAK – writer, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine;

Ihor YUKHNOVSKIY – member of the National Academy of Sciences;

Maria MATIOS – writer, laureate of the Shevchenko National Prize;

Mykola ZHULYNSKY – member of the NASU, laureate of the Shevchenko National Prize;

Dmytro HNATYUK – opera singer;

Valeriy SHEVCHUK – writer, laureate of the Shevchenko National Prize;

Yuri MUSHKETYK – writer, laureate of the Shevchenko National Prize;

Volodymyr YAVORIVSKIY – writer, Head of the National Writers’ Union;

Pavlo MOVCHAN - writer, Head of Taras Shevchenko Ukrainian Union “Prosvita”;

Hrihoriy HALYMONENKO – professor, Doctor of Philology;

Volodymyr SERGIYCHUK - professor, Doctor of History, Head of International platform “Dialogue-Eurasia”;

Vasyl SHKLYAR – writer;

Vasyl HERASYMYUK - writer, laureate of the Shevchenko National Prize;

Larysa DENYSENKO – writer, lawyer;

Oleksandr SKIPALSKIY – public and political figure;

Mykhaylo RATUSHNIY - public and political figure;

Yevhen LUPAKOV - Deputy Head of Ukraine’s Officers’ Unit;

Volodymyr PYLYPCHUK – professor, member of the National Academy of Sciences;

Natalia OSMAK - public and political figure;

Vasyl TURKEVYCH – writer;

Volodymyr HARBUZ – artist, member of National Union of Painters;

Andriy TKACHUK – public and political figure;

Yuriy DOROSHENKO – publicist.


Kyiv Post

[sjoyce]

Thanks for posting this Mike. Do you think there is anything, those of us outside Ukraine can do to bring pressure to bear on the Government? And I want to comment that those people who signed this are brave and true Ukrainians. As one who has family still there, I have been getting very worried.

[stepanstas]

Originally Posted by sjoyce

Thanks for posting this Mike. Do you think there is anything, those of us outside Ukraine can do to bring pressure to bear on the Government? And I want to comment that those people who signed this are brave and true Ukrainians. As one who has family still there, I have been getting very worried.

I suppose an on-line petition could be started on a site like Petition with GoPetition - How to Write a Petition - Online Petitions, for example. But I hardly doubt the administration would care how many people sign it, even if it gets to them.

[AkMike]

I doubt that any petition signed by anyone other than the top law prosecuters will make much of an impression. Online petitions won't hold water because anyone could vote and noting is verifiable.. I doubt that any petition will do any good until the elections.

[Gotno Gizmo]

Whilst I have no doubts that Viktor Yanukovych is all out to put Yulia Tymoshenko behind cars for political reasons alone. But with my natural distrust of almost all politicians (achieved through many years of experience), I must accept rhe probability that she has enriched herself over and above her government salary) during her period in office. After all, this is a normal practice for the majority of leading politicians within most countries of the world, and you will have a difficult time convincing me that Ukraine is any different.

See todays BBC report:-

BBC News - Ukraine launches battle against corruption

[Gotno Gizmo]

An article copied from an Associated Press release:-

KIEV, Ukraine—Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko is back in the limelight in Ukraine after losing last year's presidential election, thanks in part to a widely criticized corruption probe being conducted by the new government.
The heroine of the 2004 Orange Revolution mass protests lost the vote to longtime foe Viktor Yanukovych as Ukrainians grew angry over economic hardships, slow reforms and endless bickering in the Orange camp. But since then the government's investigation into alleged misspending by Tymoshenko and her government has energized and empowered her and her allies.

For some, the probe has transformed her image from a negligent former prime minister who had mismanaged the economy to an icon of hope and people power.

In an interview with The Associated Press this week, Tymoshenko called the charges against her "political repression" and said the government's investigation has "simply confirmed that I have worked honestly."

Her confidence is apparent as Tymoshenko, 50, turns up at the prosecutors' office to be questioned again and again in the corruption probe. She emerges confidently from her car, clad in an elegant gray coat, her blond hair braided and wrapped around her head peasant-style. Smiling, she accepts flowers from cheering fans before entering the building.

The United States and the European Union have condemned the investigation as selective prosecution of political opponents, and European officials have criticized a travel ban imposed on Tymoshenko, which prevented her from visiting a conference in Brussels last month.

Pollsters say the probe, and the media attention it has generated, have helped Tymoshenko's party maintain a steady approval rating of 13 percent over the past six months, while the popularity of Yanukovych's Party of Regions sank from 25 percent to 21 percent, thanks to unpopular tax reforms and price increases.

"The role of a victim of an unpopular government makes people sympathize with her," said Yuri Yakimenko, a political analyst with the Razumkov Center, the Kiev-based think-tank that conducted the latest polls. "This keeps her in shape."

During the interview at her office in central Kiev, Tymoshenko said: "The criminal charges that I am now facing, of course, constitute political repression. But on the other hand, it is a rehabilitation of sorts."

The wide-ranging investigation into alleged misspending by Tymoshenko and her government—which has seen more than 10 officials detained and sent others seeking refuge in the West—has helped her cast herself as a martyr and a savior of her country.

"For me, my life path is full of light because it consists of values and a real goal: to help my country get on its feet after the post-Soviet period," she said. "I want to see Ukrainians happy."

Tymoshenko, who already has served twice as prime minister and once as deputy premier, now hopes to take a majority of seats in parliament in next year's election and to run for president in a vote five years away.

Many observers agree that the charges against Tymoshenko look shaky.

She is accused of borrowing $526 million (euro380 million) in environmental funds to pay pensions amid a severe crisis and of misspending $8.4 million (euro6 million) on poorly equipped ambulances for rural hospitals that she allegedly used to drive around her activists. Tymoshenko takes pride in paying the pensions and says the ambulances she bought saved hundreds of thousands of lives in remote villages.

Tymoshenko has made 24 trips to the prosecutor's office in the past three months as part of the probe, the longest interrogation lasting 12 hours.

As press freedoms have waned under Yanukovych, making Tymoshenko a rare face on national television, she has sought to reach out to voters via the Internet.

She started a blog on Twitter last month that quickly ballooned to nearly 8,000 followers. It includes updates on her interrogation, economic analysis and personal news such as her daughter's birthday party and a photo of her jogging with her dog.

Even Yanukovych now appears uneasy.

He told reporters last month he was "annoyed" at Tymoshenko's travel ban and said the corruption investigation should "not be made overly political."

Prosecutors said this week they would allow Tymoshenko to visit her mother in her home city of Dnipropetrovsk in eastern Ukraine next week to mark Women's Day.

Tymoshenko, who spent 1.5 months in a Kiev jail in 2001 on embezzlement charges that were later overturned, says she will survive if the "mafia" authorities imprison her again.

"I do not anticipate it, but I am not afraid either," she said. "Wherever I am—in their prison or free—I will still carry out my function and this regime will be pushed away from power."

Analysts have said that whatever happens in the corruption probe authorities are unlikely to jail Tymoshenko because that would only boost her popularity even further.

Read more: Ukraine's Tymoshenko energized by probe - The Denver Post Ukraine's Tymoshenko energized by probe - The Denver Post
Read The Denver Post's Terms of Use of its content: Terms of Use - The Denver Post

[Gotno Gizmo]

Justice and ‘Justice’ in Ukraine
People First Foundation [democracywatch@peoplefirst.org.ua]
On the 24th of June the authorities initiated legal action against former Ukrainian prime-minister Yulia Tymoshenko, under accusations relating to the signing of gas agreements with Russia in 2009. By doing so the government is trying to prove formally the rumours of illegal misconduct by the former Prime minister against the national interests of Ukraine. According to the experts, and the ruling Party of Regions seek to discredit and sideline the leader of the largest oppositional force prior to the next parliamentary elections. The legal action has brought hundreds of Tymoshenko loyalists out onto the streets causing some minor scuffles with the militia. Whilst the trial is unearthing some of the former Prime minister’s less than ethical history, a number of deputies are doing their utmost to turn the proceedings into political theatre. Yulia Tymoshenko referred to the trial as "farce" organised by the President’s Administration.


The legal action against Tymoshenko has brought scandalous news about various deputies from the Party of Regions and their family members in its wake. In particular Lugansk councillor Roman Landyk, whose father is a people's deputy from the Party of Regions made national news recently. A secretly filmed video was placed on the Internet showing the recently married national deputy's son harassing a 20-year-old girl in a restaurant before, upon rejection, beating her relentlessly for 20 minutes – the young lady was hospitalised with head and neck injuries(1). A few months earlier the bodyguard of this people’s deputy beat-up a traffic inspector who had stopped their motorcade for speeding. In early July in Odessa the son of the head of the Court of Appeals in Kiev assaulted the bouncers of a nightclub after he refused to walk through the metal detector.


It seems that while declaring their intentions to restore the rule of law and justice at the very top of society, members of the Party of Regions for unknown reasons put themselves and their relatives above the law.

(1) http://www.newsru.com/crime/08jul2011/depbeatgirlrestukr.html

People First Comment: Ever since independence politics and justice have never made particularly compatible bedfellows in Ukraine as the trial of the former Prime Minister Tymoshenko clearly indicates. If the law has been violated then due legal process should follow however in this case the whole issue, simply by the way it has been mishandled, has become shrouded in politics to the extent that a fair trail and an acceptable outcome would seem impossible. Under the Constitution of Ukraine the presumption of innocence and the right to a fair trial are cardinal therefore it is up to an independent Court of law to decide the issues and not up to the court of public or in this case political opinion.


Statements by senior figures in the prosecution service would appear to violate any citizen’s primordial presumption of innocence and the manner in which this trial is being held would similarly appear to be violating her right to a fair trail and re-enforcing claims of a mistrial. Similarly the case its self would appear to set a dangerous precedent where almost any public servant could be prosecuted for abuse of position.


In view of the sensitivity of the matter it perhaps would have been wise for the judge to order a clamp down on the politicisation of the case. Furthermore the trial should be held in public as an exemplary piece of legal due process to ensure that the outcome is beyond doubt. If as a result Mrs Tymoshenko were to be ‘proven’ guilty then that would be an end to the matter, however what is currently transpiring could well open a Pandora’s box as political show trials are simply unacceptable in the 21st century.


The EU is historically balanced between support for Mrs Tymoshenko and President Yanukovich with the factions split down the middle however this case could easily change that. If so asked it would be very difficult for the EU Socialists not to vote in favour of sanctions against President Yanukovich when they recently voted in favour of sanctions against President Lukashenko for his similar treatment of the opposition. The vitally important IMF and World Bank are not particularly supportive of outwardly repressive and politically manipulative regimes. Furthermore the President can expect no favours from Moscow as Prime Minister Putin favoured Mrs Tymoshenko in the last Presidential election thus this issue could well box the authorities into an even smaller corner. Personal ambitions have never been a good advisor.


The worst aspect of this case is that as a result of the psychological pressure on society and primitivism of media, people on the street are now more interested in whether Tymoshenko will end up in jail and not how fair the trial will be.

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