Brussels - EU Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy Stefan Fule has said he expects immediate actions from the Ukrainian authorities in the case of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
He said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine: “We expect that the Ukrainian authorities will respect the judgment of the [European Court of Human Rights]. They have three months to declare their position, whether they will challenge the judgment. I very much hope that in the light of the Ukrainian commitments undertaken by the authorities, they will not use all of three months to file an appeal, and I very much hope that they will start acting on this judgment without delay.”
When asked that he means by saying “without delay,” the commissioner noted that “it’s completely certain – not to wait until the end of the period of three months, which the Ukrainian authorities have.”
“I hope that they will start acting within several weeks,” he said.
It was reported earlier that the ECHR said in publicizing its judgment on Tuesday that Tymoshenko’s arrest in the case concerning the 2009 gas supply contract with Russia had been politically motivated and her rights had been violated.
Tymoshenko was arrested during her trial dealing with the conclusion of a 2009 gas supply contract with Russia on August 5, 2011. Kyiv’s Pechersky District Court found Tymoshenko guilty of abuse of office in signing this gas supply contract and sentenced her to seven years in prison on October 11, 2011. Tymoshenko has been serving her sentence at a penitentiary in Kharkiv since December 2011. Since May 9, 2012, she has been staying at a Kharkiv hospital and receiving medial treatment there.
Apart from the complaint against Tymoshenko’s arrest, her defense team also filed a complaint with the ECHR against a violation of her right to a fair and public hearing due to political motives (Articles 6 and 18 of the European Convention on Human Rights), meaning her conviction in the 2009 gas supply case. The proceedings on the complaint were opened in October 2012.
