The Shevchenkivsky District Court in Kyiv on Thursday granted an investigator's request to arrest ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who has already been arrested in the gas case earlier, in connection with an inquiry into the United Energy Systems of Ukraine (UESU) corporation.
The relevant decision was issued by the court at an offsite session at the Lukyanivka pre-trial detention facility on Thursday, the ex-prime minister’s defense attorney, Sergei Vlasenko, told journalists on Thursday.
"Unfortunately, Shevchenkivsky District Court judge Trubnikov … announced a decree whereby Tymoshenko is arrested for the second time," Vlasenko told journalists after emerging from the jail building.
It was reported that on Dec. 6, 2011, the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) asked the Shevchenkivsky District Court to arrest Tymoshenko, given the gravity of her crimes and their repeated commission.
"The effective Ukrainian criminal procedural laws allow to choose remand of a person against whom a court has issued a verdict for the commission of another crime. Moreover, Article 155 part five of the Ukrainian Penal Code allows to choose remand of a person, even if that person is serving a sentence at a penal institution," the SBU said.
The SBU Main Investigative Directorate is probing a criminal case against ex-prime ministers Tymoshenko and Pavlo Lazarenko over the attempted misuse of $405 million in state budget funds in 1996-2000.
Moreover, the State Tax Administration of Ukraine was investigating a criminal case against Tymoshenko charged with organizing the concealment of over $165 million in foreign-currency revenues, illegal reimbursement of budget funds and tax evasion amounting in total to over Hr 47 million by way of introducing a financial scheme involving payments for the commodity and material valuables of the UESU corporation and subsequent concealment of the income received through off-shore companies, which was used by her for personal enrichment.
The ex-prime minister has been held at a pre-trial detention center since Aug. 5, 2011.
On Oct. 11 the Pechersky District Court sentenced Tymoshenko to seven years of imprisonment for exceeding her authorities when signing gas agreements with Russia in 2009.
Earlier her lawyer Vlasenko commented on the court’s intention to consider a second arrest of the ex-prime minister: "This is illegal, illogical and unsubstantiated."
"They are so afraid of Tymoshenko that they are ready to arrest her for the second, third, tenth, fifteenth time and so on," Vlasenko said. When asked whether it is an absurdity to arrest Tymoshenko who is already in prison, he said: "That is what it is – absurdity."
