You're reading: State Penitentiary Service: Lutsenko taking nutritional mixture every day

Former Ukrainian Interior Minister and People's Self-Defense Party leader Yuriy Lutsenko has been put on a drip and given a nutritional mixture every day since May 1, 2011, which helped stabilize his health condition that worsened after he went on a hunger strike, the State Penitentiary Service of Ukraine has reported.

"The health of former Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko (who, while in the Kyiv pre-trial detention facility, is refusing to eat) worsened on May 1 this year. Based on medical records, he had been offered a special nutritional mixture in order to support the vital activity of his body, which he, in the presence of prison staff, took without any complaints. After that, he was put on a drip in order to improve the work of his system," the State Penitentiary Service said in a press release on Wednesday.

The document also notes that on May 4, Ukrainian human rights commissioner (ombudsperson) Nina Karpachova visited the pre-trial detention facility and familiarized herself with the conditions of Lutsenko’s detention, describing the conditions as proper and the actions of the prison staff as legal.

The press release also notes that Lutsenko made no complaints to the prison staff.

Meanwhile, the People’s Self-Defense Party said in a statement on its Web site that the ex-minister’s lawyers Ihor Fomin, Volodymyr Orlov and his wife Iryna had submitted a petition to the Prosecutor General’s Office declaring their refusal to examine the materials of a criminal case opened against Lutsenko and demanded that Lutsenko be released from custody due to the worsening of his health.

The statement was sent to Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka, his first deputy Renat Kuzmin and investigator Serhiy Voichenko.

The statement notes that Lutsenko started a hunger strike on April 22 in protest against his illegal arrest and detention in the pre-trial detention facility.

"Starting from May 1, due to a sharp deterioration in his health condition, the administration of the pre-trial detention facility decided to force-feed Lutsenko. Nevertheless, the dramatic loss of 14 kilograms in weight, the high concentration of acetone in his body, problems with blood pressure and the extension of his refusal to take food pose a clear threat to his life and health.

In this connection, Lutsenko’s lawyers and defender are rejecting their right to examine the materials of the criminal case, which the Prosecutor General’s Office is using as another far-fetched reason for Lutsenko’s detention," reads the petition.

The lawyers also asked the Prosecutor General’s Office to consider the petition in a short time due to the worsening of Lutsenko’s health.