An April 30 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s 2011 arrest was unlawful won’t free her immediately from prison.
But the
ruling casts doubt over the entire judicial proceedings in her abuse-of-office
trial and may lead to cancellation of the guilty verdict against her, Valentyna
Telychenko, her representative in European Court said.
The European
court unanimously recognized Tymoshenko’s Aug. 5, 2011 arrest as illegal and politically
motivated, fueling speculation that she may get released or even eventually pardoned
by her nemesis President Viktor Yanukovych, who set her ally Yuriy Lutsenko –
the former interior minister – free on April 7.
Tymoshenko’s
family and her supporters demand her immediate release. “It’s a big win for us
and we expect her release in the nearest days,” her daughter, Yevgenia, said at
the press conference.
Telychenko,
however, said Tymoshenko’s release may take months and only a Ukrainian court
can decide.
“This
decision doesn’t require directly anybody’s release,” she said. “But as Judge Rodion Kireyev was the one who,
according to this decision had political motives in arresting her, this means
his verdict can’t be trustworthy,” she added.
So
Tymoshenko’s lawyers could appeal to Ukraine’s Supreme Court with demands to
cancel Kireyev’s decision and release her, Telychenko said.
Tymoshenko
is now serving her seven-year prison term for abuse of office in a case widely
seen in the West as politically motivated.
The best
case scenario is for Ukraine’s Supreme Court to cancel Kireyev’s verdict, a
decision that could lead to Tymoshenko’s release by the end of September,
Telychenko said.
Ukraine’s
government has three months to appeal the European court’s decision and is now
considering the option, Nazar Kulchytsky, Ukraine’s government representative
at the European court, said.
But Telychenko
believes that the Ukrainian government has no chance to win the appeal so “it would be more right for it to
release Tymoshenko and avoid negative (PR) ahead of signing of association
agreement with the EU.”
Tymoshenko’s
fate remains one of the main concerns of the European Union in deciding whether
to sign a political and trade association agreement with Ukraine in Vilnius,
Lithuania, in November.
Another way
to set Tymoshenko free could be a pardon by Yanukovych, Telychenko said. On
April 7, Yanukovych released this way Ukraine’s former interior minister Yuriy
Lutsenko, whose arrest was recognized by the European Court as illegal.
Lutsenko had
been sentenced to four years in prison for abuse of power in a case seen as a political
vendetta. “My release could be a 100 percent precedent for Tymoshenko’s
release,” Lutsenko told the Kyiv Post earlier this month.
Kyiv
Post staff writer Oksana Grytsenko can be reached at [email protected]
