You're reading: Tymoshenko refuses to go to court for health reasons

Ihor Kolpaschykov, the head of Kachanivska penal colony, said Ukraine's former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko has issued a statement saying she refuses to go to Kharkiv District Court, where the case involving abuse by the corporation United Energy Systems of Ukraine (UESU) will be tried on Friday.

“We have her statement saying that she is refusing to go to the court building for health reasons,” Kolpaschykov told Interfax-Ukraine.

On January 16, Tymoshenko’s lawyer Serhiy Vlasenko said doctors from the Berlin clinic Charite, who are coordinating Timoshenko’s’ rehabilitation program, doubt that her health allows her transportation to the court.

At the same time, Mykhailo Afanasyev, head doctor of Central Clinical Hospital No. 5, earlier said the international medical commission has come to the conclusion that there are no medical reasons why Yulia Tymoshenko cannot be transported to court. At the same time, he reiterated that decisions on Tymoshenko’s transportation to court are made by the judge, not doctors.

In December 2012, Vlasenko said the penitentiary service had been ordered to take Tymoshenko to the January 18 hearing at any costs. The penitentiary service denied that information.

The next hearing of the case involving UESU, in which Tymoshenko is a suspect, is scheduled to take place on Friday, January 18. The previous hearing of the case was held on December 18, 2012.

A private hearing of the case was held on April 19, 2012. Tymoshenko did not attend any of those hearings.