You're reading: Melnychenko, fearing for his life, flees to United States

Mykola Melnychenko, the former presidential security guard who claims to have secretly recorded conversations that implicate Leonid Kuchma and other top officials in serious crimes, is back in the United States again.

In an interview with the Kyiv Post, Melnychenko said he fled Ukraine because he learned of a plot to kill him, which he believes may be orchestrated by parliamentary speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn to “set up” President Viktor Yanukovych.

Lytvyn’s representatives say they will not dignify Melnychenko’s baseless allegations with a response, while Yanukovych’s spokespeople did not respond.

Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka said last week that authorities are searching for Melnychenko, who is reportedly under investigation for treason.

Melnychenko claims that his recordings caught Kuchma and Lytvyn, who was Kuchma’s chief of staff in 2000, engaging in criminal activities, including the plot to kill Gongadze on Sept. 16, 2000.

Kuchma and Lytvyn have always denied the allegations and dismissed Melnychenko’s credibility.

Melnychenko fled as former police general Oleksiy Pukach is being tried secretly for carrying out Gongadze’s murder.

Three Pukach subordinates are convicted in the murder and serving prison sentences. Pukach’s supervisor, ex-Interior Minister Yuriy Kravchenko, died from two gunshot wounds to the head on March 5, 2005, the day he was supposed to be questioned in the case.

Meanwhile, Kuchma, who was close to Kravchenko, has faced criminal charges since March that he exceeded his authority as president in giving an order that led to Gongadze’s murder. Melnychenko’s tapes were declared to be material evidence in the case.

Kuchma’s lawyers said Melnychenko likely fled to avoid justice, but the ex-security guard told the Kyiv Post that he is “not hiding from any investigation.”

He said that he left Ukraine after learning of a plot to kill him and Pukach – both key witnesses in the Gongadze case.

He also said he expects the firing of first deputy prosecutor general Rinat Kuzmin, who launched the criminal investigations against Kuchma and against Yulia Tymoshenko. The ex-prime minister is serving a seven-year prison sentence after an Oct. 11 conviction on abuse-of-office charges that many view as political persecution.

Kuchma lawyers Viktor Petrunenko and Serhiy Ulianov, in response to the latest developments, said that Melnychenko “has escaped from investigation in order to avoid liability for incriminated crimes and escape answering the questions of law enforcement authorities and of Kuchma’s defense, regarding connections of his and his secret curators’ actions with the death of Georgiy Gongadze.”

The lawyers for the president who ruled from 1994-2005 also said: “We would like to emphasize that only identification of all persons and circumstances, regarding the records in the office of president of Ukraine, their editing, assembling and disclosure, will make possible to define the real masterminds and organizers of the killing of Georgiy Gongadze.”

The following are excerpts from the Kyiv Post interview with Melnychenko:

Kyiv Post:
Are you currently in the U.S. When did you leave Ukraine?

Mykola Melnychenko: I left Ukraine in early October. I initially stopped in several European countries, but am currently in the U.S.

KP: How did you leave Ukraine? Who helped you?

MM: I left the country using my papers and did it absolutely legally.

KP: We heard that you believe that your life is under threat. Who is supposedly threatening you or who is behind those life threats?

MM:
There was a plan to physically exterminate me. I had the privilege of listening to an audio recording in which I recognized the voice of [President Viktor] Yanukovych and the voice of Lytvyn. When talking about me someone who sounded like Yanukovych said: “I will kill him.”

KP:
Do you think somebody wanted to set up Yanukovych or, in your opinion, does he truly want you to disappear?

MM: I am convinced that by killing me somebody wants to set up Yanukovych.

KP: Do you have any idea as to who that might be?

MM: Lytvyn and his people.

KP: You blame Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka for lying about the travel ban on you. But Pshonka is, allegedly, the president’s man. He was appointed by the president. So don’t you think that Yanukovych is behind Pshonka’s actions?

MM: Yanukovych will quickly get rid of this ballast. Pshonka is brazenly lying when he says that I am hiding, that I was summoned [for questioning], and that I was under a travel ban. I do not think that he will tolerate being set up.

KP: In what context was the word “kill” said in that recording that you are talking about?

MM: We submitted this recording for analysis. And I am praying to hear that the voice of Yanukovych on the tape is fake. This way we can understand if Ukraine is really rolling back to [Josef Stalin’s times of terror in] 1937, or whether someone wants to create such an image of Yanukovych.

KP: Who exactly did you give the tape to for examination? Was it the FBI, like with your previous tapes, or someone else?

MM: This is a private entity. They promised to complete the tests of the tape within a month.

KP: Is the company located in the U.S. or elsewhere?

MM: I won’t say that now. It is important first of all for me, myself, to determine the authenticity of this recording.

KP: When are you planning to return to Ukraine?

MM:
I do not see this to be necessary now. Due to the signals regarding my physical elimination, I see no reason to return to Ukraine anytime soon. For two months I had been demanding that the state Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and the General Prosecutor’s Office conduct investigations on the criminal case against me that was re-launched.

KP:
You mentioned the criminal case against you. What are you officially charged with?

MM:
On Aug. 9, I sent a request to the SBU and the General Prosecutor’s Office to let me know if any criminal case was launched against me. But by the end of September there was no response.

KP: What do you think about the current investigation into Gongadze’s murder? Do you think that cover-up of the crime is continuing or not?

MM: I am convinced that there is now a plan to physically eliminate two people who point at Kuchma and Lytvyn [as those who allegedly ordered the murder of Gongadze] – Pukach and myself. Sooner or later they will kill Pukach. I think it will happen soon. Also Kuzmin will be removed, at least from his current position. A lot of money is pumped to make sure neither Kuchma nor Lytvyn are prosecuted for the murder of Gongadze.

KP: Do you really think Kuchma and Lytvyn are now that powerful to do anything like that?

MM: In the above-mentioned tape they are heard as offering Yanukovych financial and media assistance to manipulate public opinion in Ukraine. Yanukovych needs such assistance.

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Kyiv Post staff writer Yuriy Onyshkiv can be reached at [email protected].