Among the sensational details:
She insists that she knows the connection between her attackers and state
authorities. However, Chornovol said she cannot divulge the link now in order
not to compromise a parallel investigation that is being conducted in addition
to the official one which has led to the arrest of five suspects.
She said that nobody knew she
was going to be driving home just before the attack. She made the decision
after she already left work and she told no one, not even her family. She was
escorted to her car and her colleagues made sure she wasn’t being followed, so Chornovol
assumes that a tail was put on her later. She’s not sure when it happened, but
noticed the tail only when she was turning towards the village of Hora in Kyiv
Oblast.
She was followed by two cars. Chornovol
decided to return to Maidan (Independence Square) and tried to get rid of the
tail on the village streets that are very familiar to her. She succeeded only
partially: one car was lost, but the other one went on following.
Chornovol called no one about
being followed because outside the barricades of Maidan she usually takes the
battery out of her phone so that it cannot be used to track her. During the
pursuit she was not physically able to re-assemble the phone.
When she turned towards Kyiv,
her pursuers began to overtake her by their Porsche Cayenne and cut in front of
her car. The first bump was not powerful enough, but the second one sent her
Chevrolet Aveo off the highway. However, Chornovol managed to drive out of the
ditch. She clearly saw the license plate of the pursuers’ car, but could not
call anyone. She also was not sure if her dashcam was recording anything at
all.
When they blocked her car for
the first time, one of the attackers jumped out of their car, tugged the
driver’s door and then broke the side window with a single blow. Nevertheless, Chornovol
managed to swerve around him and drive forward. The pursuers had to leave their
accomplice behind to follow her.
After another bump, Chornovol’s
car turned around and she began to drive the wrong way. It was exactly then
when she saw the attacker who was left behind earlier. Chornovol had later recognized
him from his photo among the five men detained as suspects in the crime.
However, she had not formally identified him yet. She had never seen any of the
detainees before the accident.
She tried to honk, but other
drivers were paying no attention. She hoped to get to Nova Linia supermarket
and ram their door to have them call police. It was only about 200 meters
remaining when the attackers finally succeeded to stop her car dead.
Chornovol refutes the
testimony by one of the detainees, Serhiy Kotenko, that there were only three of them in the car, and that he took no part in
the attack and was just sitting in the back seat. According to her, when two
men stepped out of their car (it is clearly seen on the video) and she began to
run, the Porsche Cayenne drove towards her, so she had to jump out of its way.
She remembers almost nothing
of the beating, she said. However, she recovered consciousness once in the
middle of it. She recalls standing and being beaten in the face. She could not
recognize those who were beating her because she didn’t see them (probably because
her eyes were already filled with blood).
Chornovol regained
consciousness completely only at the hospital. Her memories of the prior events
are fragmentary. She was discovered by a traffic police squad, which was called
by the supermarket security guard who noticed a wrecked car abandoned for a
long time in the leftmost lane with its headlights on.
She rejects the version
suggested by some media that the beating was preceded by a “common road
conflict.” She points out her considerable driving experience (16 years),
during which she had no road accident.
She describes herself as a careful driver.
Chornovol also flatly rejects
another widespread version that the assault was organized by the opposition.
Being asked who she believes to be the person behind the scenes, she
unequivocally points to President Viktor Yanukovych, because it was he and his family
whom Chornovol’s investigative journalism of the past three years focused on.
When reminded that just before
the attack that she published a caustic blog post on Interior Minister Vitaliy
Zakharchenko, she replied that he was just a servant, not an independent
participant.
Chornovol explained why a
number of short fragments were missing from the video. According to her, it
happened not because the video was altered, but because her cheap dashcam was
losing a few seconds of recording each time it created a new file. Also, since
the dashcam kept on recording for about an hour after she left the car, some
files at the beginning of the pursuit were lost.
Asked why she kept silent
through the entire video, Chornovol said she had no time for screaming or
swearing.
She maintains that she knows
the connection between the attackers and the state authority. However, Chornovol
cannot divulge it at this moment in order not to compromise a parallel
investigation that is being conducted in addition to the official one.
Chornovol claims that the
statement by the Ministry of Health alleging that she refused to be discharged
from the hospital is entirely false. According to her, the authorities tried to
discharge her as soon as possible to be able to qualify her injuries as less
severe, so that her attackers would get a lighter penalty.
Mykola Berezovy, Chornovol’s husband, expressed his desire to find out what physicians provided
the information to base such “ridiculous conclusions” on. Berezovy also told
that, in order to avoid any “insinuations,” Chornovol was examined by Mykola
Polischuk, a world-renowned neurosurgeon and former health minister. Polischuk stated that, in his
professional opinion based on 40 years of practice, Chornovol is in need of
further observation and treatment at a hospital.
Chornovol’s attending
physicians, according to Polischuk, also share this opinion. Polischuk assessed
her current condition as “moderate, relatively satisfactory”. According to his
observations, Chornovol is easily tired, cannot remain active or even seated
for a long time. After being discharged from a hospital, she will need up to
six weeks of rehabilitation in coming days. Polischuk noted that, besides a cerebral
contusion, facial fracture and severe eye contusion, Chornovol is at risk of
pneumonia caused by blood flowing into the lungs through multiple facial bone
fractures and prolonged cold exposure.
Polischuk was also asked how
he assesses the severity of injuries from the assault. He replied that,
considering the cold and the absence of medical attention, he would assess the
injuries inflicted as severe to life-threatening.
Mustafa Nayyem is an investigative journalist
with Ukrainska Pravda and a co-founder of Hromadske TV.
