Valentyna Telychenko, a lawyer of Myroslava Gongadze, the wife of murdered journalist Georgy Gongadze, intends to appeal against the verdict of Kyiv's Pechersky District Court in a criminal case against former chief of the external surveillance department of the Ukrainian Interior Ministry, Oleksiy Pukach, who was found guilty of the murder of Gongadze and sentenced to life in prison for it.
“We will appeal, as I disagree with the statement that the crime was not ordered. Apart from the motive related to Pukach’s career, another motive was to fulfill an order [to kill Gongadze]. I am surprised by the fact that the court declared that the fact that [then Interior Minister Yuriy] Kravchenko gave instructions to Pukach had been proven, and at the same time it refuses to admit the fact that the murder was ordered by someone,” Telychenko said.
In December 2010, the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine (PGO) announced that the investigation into the criminal case on Gongadze’s murder was over. The investigation confirmed that Pukach killed the journalist by order of then Interior Minister Yuriy Kravchenko.
On March 4, 2005 Kravchenko was found shot dead in his house in Kyiv region. The day before he had been summoned for questioning on the Gongadze case.
In 2005 the PGO stated that Kravchenko committed suicide and closed the criminal case on his death.
