You're reading: Human rights activists say prosecutors should work harder on solving EuroMaidan crimes

Since Ukrainian authorities haven't reported much progress in investigating the murders of more than 100 EuroMaidan protesters nearly a year ago, human rights activists and others are concerned.

Prosecutors even devoted a special unit to investigating the cases. But society expects the guilty to have been brought to trial and punished by now. Officially, 21 riot police officers are charged but most of them have gone into hiding.

Ukrainian activists raise numerous doubts regarding ability of prosecutors effectively investigate the killings of the EuroMaidan activists. Despite numerous ample video and other evidence, the investigations seem to have stalled.

Prosecutor General Vitaliy Yarema said the mass escape of those officers under suspicion is the key reason for the delay. Some of them fled to Russian-controlled areas of the eastern Donbas region of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. Overall, as many as 150 riot police officers escaped to Russia, according to prosecutors.

Meanwhile, a substantial part of the documents were destroyed by police before the revolution succeeded in toppling Prseident Victor Yanukovych. 

Representatives of the International Federation for Human Rights, a Paris-based nongovernmental organization, came to Kyiv to present their vision of the case. Russia’s crimes in Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk also concern them.

Delphine Carlens of the International Federation for Human Rigths says “the perpetrators of egregious violations of human rights in Ukraine cannot remain with impunity.”

Kyiv Post legal affairs reporter Mariana Antonovych can be reached at [email protected].