BRUSSELS – European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso promised Yevhenia Tymoshenko, the daughter of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, that he will keep insisting on release of her mother, Deputy Head of the Batkivschyna Party Hryhoriy Nemyria has said.
In an interview with Ukrainian journalists in Brussels on Thursday,
December 13, following the summit of the European People’s Party (EPP),
Nemyria said: “In a conversation with Barroso we heard a very personal
aspect. He, as a president of the European Commission, very closely
cooperated with Tymoshenko, as a prime minister of the government, which
undertook responsibility and made a crucial contribution into the
settlement of the 2009 gas crisis. He expressed appreciation to
Tymoshenko once again and said that he will stand for her freedom.
Tymoshenko’s freedom won’t be exchanged for the formalities related to
the Association Agreement.”
Yevhenia Tymoshenko told the journalists that except for the meeting
with Barroso she also met with the premiers of Slovenia, Bulgaria,
Finland, as well as EPP President Wilfried Martens. According to
Tymoshenko, the Ukrainian delegation thanked the European officials for
the EPP’s declaration and discussed the resolution of the European
Parliament, which contains a call for release of political prisoners.
“The ball is in the court of the Ukrainian government now. These
documents, as well as the EU Council’s conclusions containing conditions
for the signing of the Association Agreement create a platform for Kyiv
and the president to act within these conditions and the resolutions,”
the ex-premier’s daughter said.
In addition, Yevhenia Tymoshenko once again told her European interlocutors that her “mother’s position did not change.”
“The Association Agreement has to be signed and it will be signed.
The only question is when, and the European side has outlined this
‘when’ in its conditions,” she said.
According to Nemyria, at the EPP summit he presented a report on the
situation in Ukraine after the parliamentary elections and read aloud
Yulia Tymoshenko’s evaluation of the EU Council’s conclusions, the EP’s
resolution, and the extended position of the foreign ministers of the
countries where the EPP rules.
“To sum up the three documents, the EPP’s position contains more
detailed conditions, expectations, guidelines, and a time reference – it
mentions the autumn of 2013. By that time specific results on all of
the three items should be demonstrated, instead of making new
statements. These results will be evaluated during the preparations for
the EU-Ukraine Summit and within other mechanisms of cooperation. They
told us and stressed that the evaluation of the implementation of the
conditions by the government will be taken into account, and the
opposition’s and Tymoshenko’s opinions will also be requested,” Nemyria
said.
