About 3,000 Ukrainians gathered on Nov. 27 at Ukraine’s Lukyanivska prison to greet jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko on the occasion of her 51st birthday, Interfax-Ukraine reported citing one of its journalists on the scene.
Reports from Ukrainian News and Liga news agencies put the crowd numbers at 4,000-5,000.
Some participants brought flowers. Others held flags of Tymoshenko’s Batkivshchyna party, and its loyal allies – the Reform and Order, For Ukraine and Rukh parties — according to Interfax-Ukraine.
Tymoshenko’s right hand man, politician Oleksandr Turchynov, spoke to the crowds as did lawmakers Arseniy Yatseniuk from the Front Change opposition party and Vyacheslav Kyrylenko of the For Ukraine grouping.
Tymoshenko, who celebrated her 51st birthday on Nov. 27, has been in jail since August 5. She was first put behind bars on contempt of court charges handed down during a trial that last throughout last summer.
On Oct. 11, Kyiv’s Pechersk District Court Judge Rodion Kireyev sentenced Tymoshenko to seven years in prison for exceeding authority in brokering a natural gas supply agreement with Russia in 2009 while she was prime minister.
The case is widely seen in and outside of Ukraine as a politically motivated attempt by President Viktor Yanukovych to sideline his main political opponent. Yanukovych denies such allegations, but EU officials have repeatedly warned his administration that closer relations between Ukraine and the 27-member bloc hang on Tymoshenko’s release and adherence to core EU values such as democracy and rule of law.
In pointing to a long list of alleged crimes committed by Tymoshenko, Ukrainian officials have tried with no success to convince the EU and U.S. that the former Orange Revolution leader deserves to be in jail.
On Nov. 26, a senior Ukrainian prosecutor said that authorities had gathered enough evidence to link jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko to the 1996 murder of politician Yevgeny Shcherban.
Allies of Tymoshenko have denied this and other charges accusing Yanukovych’s administration of trumping up fresh yet still politically motivated charges.
