You're reading: Kuzmin: Tymoshenko suspected of murder, political oppression out of question

First Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine Renat Kuzmin has stated that the criminal prosecution of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko contains no signs of political oppression. 

“What is political oppression? Let’s interpret notions in the same way. Political oppression is illegal persecution of political opponents for their political activities. When a person is accused of murder, tax evasion, embezzlement in especially big amounts, abuse of power, and when a person is notified of being suspected of having organized and paid for murder, what political oppression are we talking about?” Kuzmin said at the Freedom of Speech political talk show on the ICTV Channel on Monday.

Kuzmin also said he wondered how one could see a political motive in the case in which Tymoshenko is suspected of having organized the murder of parliamentarian Yevhen Scherban.

“Today, when convict Tymoshenko was notified of being a suspect in the murder case everyone went into hysteric. Dear friends, this should not be politicized,” he said.

As reported, Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka said at a briefing on January 18 that the Prosecutor General’s Office had finished its investigation into the criminal case on the murder of MP Yevhen Scherban, who was shot dead in 1996, and that former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko had been notified of being suspected of having organized the crime, along with former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko.

Pshonka also announced that the criminal case on the murder of Scherban and the criminal case on the embezzlement of public funds to repay debts of the United Energy Systems of Ukraine (UESU) Corporation to the Russian Defense Ministry were united in one case.

Pshonka added that the Ukrainian government had started paying the debt of the UESU to the Russian Defense Ministry under a ruling of Kyiv Court of Appeals. According to him, Ukraine has paid Hr 15 million to Russia.

Scherban, a member of the Liberal Party’s executive committee and a parliamentarian, was gunned down while disembarking a plane at the Donetsk airport on Nov. 3, 1996. The killers fled the scene in a car. Scherban, his wife and a mechanic died from injuries on the spot. The plane’s flight engineer suffered injuries to his neck and later died in a hospital. Law enforcement agencies ruled out a political motive behind the crime.

The Luhansk Regional Court of Appeals found Vadym Bolotskykh guilty of killing Scherban and sentenced him to life in prison in April 2003.

Yevhen Scherban’s son, Ruslan Scherban, a member of the Donetsk Regional Council, said at a press conference on April 4, 2012 that he had passed to the Prosecutor General’s Office documents indicating Tymoshenko’s and Lazarenko’s possible involvement in his father’s murder.

Tymoshenko and Lazarenko have categorically denied being involved in the murder.