Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has refused a medical examination by experts of the Health Ministry and insists on a checkup by independent doctors.
Tymoshenko’s press secretary Maryna Soroka announced this on Jan.5.
"At request by Yulia Volodymyrivna Tymoshenko, I state that she refuses politically-biased health commissions formed in the presidential administration, and insists on a checkup by independent doctors, whom international organizations and governments of democratic countries are willing to provide," the Batkivschyna party’s press service quoted Soroka as saying on Thursday, Jan. 5.
According to her, medical commissions and the Health Ministry continue to "mislead" the public about the real state of Tymoshenko’s health and thus "help to carry out the scenario of the authorities aimed at moral and physical destruction of Yulia Tymoshenko".
Earlier, the Health Ministry reported that Tymoshenko, who is serving her sentence at the Kachanivska Penal Colony in Kharkiv, had been examined by a Health Ministry commission comprised of nine "leading specialists" in various fields, and that the doctors had pronounced her to be in a "satisfactory" condition.
"The specialists have given recommendations for the further treatment of Tymoshenko: more intensive movement, therapeutic massage and exercise therapy, and further surveillance by medical service personnel," the ministry said.
Tymoshenko was also offered a general blood test at a Health Ministry-run institution, but she refused.
The ex-premier does not trust doctors who "depend on the regime and grovel before it," her spokeswoman said as quoted in Thursday’s statement.
Soroka mentioned that the Canadian government had offered Tymoshenko a medical checkup and treatment.
"However, the regime is afraid to let in independent medical personnel because then the entire world would be horrified by the fascist methods of the current government, which has been unable to break the spirit of Yulia Tymoshenko, who has been illegally convicted, and is therefore trying to liquidate her physically," Soroka said.
The spokeswoman said painkillers are the only medical assistance Tymoshenko is receiving.
