Melnychenko: Ukraine has secret service engaging in political assassinations

Former major of the Ukrainian State Department of Guard Mykola Melnychenko has said that Ukraine has an illegal secret service engaging in political assassinations. "Ukraine has a very powerful, strictly classified and fairly well equipped illegal special service that engages in political assassinations. A certain analog of notorious "Kravchenko's eagles" and Belarusian "death squads". The positions of the special service are strengthening. One of its tasks was to eliminate me," he said in an interview with Segodnya newspaper published on Friday.

Melnychenko said that the special service comprises former and acting officers of the SBU, military counterintelligence, police and prosecutor's office. "They are operating in the interests of oligarchs," he said.

"However, my removal is not the only task of the special service. One more is to set up President Viktor Yanukovych. A special operation is being conducted to discredit him and ultimately remove him from power. He has crossed paths with too many people and they will not forgive him. Serious forces in and outside of Ukraine are involved in the orbit of the special operation. Everything is very serious," he said.

On July 29, 2011, Kyiv Court of Appeals upheld a Pechersky District Court of Kyiv ruling of June 23, 2011, which canceled a resolution by former Prosecutor General Sviatoslav Piskun dated March 1, 2005, which closed a criminal case against Melnychenko.

The criminal case was opened against Melnychenko regarding the leaking of state secrets, abuse of office and the use of forged documents.

On October 14, the Prosecutor General's Office said that Melnychenko twice attempted to leave Ukrainian territory and that on September 23, an SBU investigator issued a resolution to put him on the wanted list.

The office recalled that as part of the investigation into a criminal case opened against Melnychenko, in order to prevent possible attempts to evade investigation, it had been decided to impose a ban on his foreign travels pending the completion of a pretrial investigation.

Melnychenko is currently staying in the United States.