Former State Guard Department Major Mykola Melnychenko has posted a statement on Facebook regarding the killing of Ukrainian MP Yevhen Scherban in 1996.
In particular, he said that according to the conversations he
recorded, former Ukrainian Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko ordered
Scherban’s killing, whereas Lazarenko’s business partner, Petro
Kyrychenko, and former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko
financed the murder.
“Lazarenko was named a person that ordered Scherban’s murder, and a
reason for this was taking control of Donetsk region. The killing was
organized by Kushnir [the leader of a criminal group that operated in
Donetsk and Luhansk regions, who died in Donetsk’s detention center],
and the payment for the killing was made by Kyrychenko and Tymoshenko,”
reads the statement.
The statement also notes that the ex-major learned of the
circumstances of the investigation into the murder from the
conversations that he heard in the office of former Ukrainian President
Leonid Kuchma with senior officials and civil servants.
“I learned of the circumstances of the investigation into this crime
from the conversations that I heard in Kuchma’s office. Kuchma had
conversations with Ukrainian Prosecutor General [Mykhailo] Potebenko,
[Mykola] Obykhod, and others. I have the recordings of these
conversations,” Melnychenko said.
He also said that the audio recordings, in his opinion, clearly say
how participants in the conversation discussed evidence of Lazarenko’s
guilt in committing the killing of MP Scherban.
“The [murder] was also discussed with other individuals, in
particular, with former Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine Obykhod,”
Melnychenko said.
As reported, Yevhen Scherban’s son, Ruslan Scherban, a member of the
Donetsk Regional Council, said at a press conference on April 4, 2012
that he had passed documents indicating to Tymoshenko’s and Lazarenko’s
possible involvement in his father’s murder to the Prosecutor General’s
Office.
Tymoshenko and Lazarenko have categorically denied their involvement in the murder.
