Moscow - The Moscow Basmanny Court arrested Ukrainian Right Sector leader Dmytro Yarosh in absentia on March 12 on the counts of extremist appeals.
The court upheld the arrest in absentia request of the detectives, an Interfax correspondent reports.
Judge Natalia Dudar agreed that Yarosh “might carry on his criminal activity, pressure witnesses or hinder the inquiry into his criminal case in another way” if a measure of restraint other than arrest were chosen.
A detective told the court that Yarosh drew up “in an unknown period of time and at an unknown place” and published on the webpage of his movement a text entitled “Appeal of Right Sector leader Dmitry Yarosh to Doku Umarov”, which urged “the leader of the terrorist organization to step up extremist and terrorist operations against Russia.”
The detective said that the Right Sector leader did not permanently reside in Russia and his whereabouts were unknown but they had information he might be staying in Ukraine or Poland.
“A measure of restraint other than arrest cannot guarantee that he will stop his criminal activity. There is no information about possible illnesses which may prevent incarceration of D. Yarosh,” the detective said.
Meanwhile, Yarosh’s defense team said he was not properly notified about the charges consistent with Russian and international laws, which violated his right to choose a lawyer.
“The political dimension of this case must not influence the court. There is no evidence in the case file to confirm that Mr. Yarosh has been notified. Even if Yarosh has no wish to communicate with Russian authorities, they should have used every method to keep him posted,” the lawyer said.
The detectives accused Yarosh under Part 2 Article 205.2 and Part 2 Article 280 of the Russian Criminal Code (public appeals for terrorism and extremism made in mass media).
The Right Sector leader was put on the international most wanted list and accusations were brought against him in absentia.
The Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office press service said they had no grounds to detain Ukrainian citizen Yarosh and extradite him to a foreign state.
