You're reading: Activists urge Yanukovych not to ‘entangle’ Ukraine in Customs Union

The People's Committee for Defending Ukraine has cautioned Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych against attempts to "entangle" Ukraine in the Customs Union.

“All of your attempts to entangle Ukraine in the Customs Union and/or to change the constitutional system in a way not authorized by the constitution will mark the beginning of a new wave of public action to remove you from office,” the Committee said in an appeal, read out at a news conference in Kyiv on Monday.

The Committee also said that the three years that have passed since Yanukovych came to power, “are marked by a betrayal of the national interests and systematic abuses of fundamental human rights and liberties.”

Membership in the Customs Union will ruin Ukraine’s European civilization perspective and destroy it as an independent state, the authors write.

The statement says that the authorities are preparing a referendum on Ukraine’s accession to the Customs Union and that its result will be rigged if it is held.

The appeal will be handed to the presidential administration on Monday. It has been signed by about 200 activists so far.