You're reading: Police: Two charged for laser-beamed slogan demanding Tymoshenko release

Two persons were charged with unauthorized use of laser beam equipment for projecting a slogan onto a building and stele in central Kyiv demanding the release of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, convicted of exceeding her powers by orchestrating a natural gas deal that was allegedly damaging to Ukraine.

The slogan "Freedom to Yulia" appeared on the building of the philharmonic society and the Independence Stele in central Kyiv during a New Year’s show on Independence Square.

The Kyiv police authority said in a statement that the projections had been done out of a room in the Kozatsky hotel.

"Police were called in, and when they arrived, [those who did the projections] voluntarily opened the door of their room and switched off the projector. However, they were behaving defiantly and threatening the police," the statement said.

They were charged and told to come to court but neither of them was arrested, it said.

Earlier on Sunday, Tymoshenko’s Batkivschyna (Fatherland) party said in a statement that five men in police uniform had broken into a room at the Kozatsky where parliament deputy Andriy Pavlovsky was celebrating New Year’s with some friends. Pavlovsky is a member of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc-Batkivschyna coalition.

"According to the deputy, the police first broke down the door of the room with their feet and when rushed in without any explanations and unplugged all the electric appliances," Batkivschyna said.

The police authority, however, said in its statement that neither of the people who had done the projections was a parliament deputy.

Tymoshenko, who arranged the gas deal during her office as premier in 2009, was moved from a detention center in Kyiv to a prison in the Kharkiv region on Friday to serve her seven-year sentence.