Moscow - Ukrainian Andriy Zinchenko, whose extradition from Russia the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office has been seeking for half a year on suspicion of attacking Ukrainian journalist and activist Tetiana Chornovol, has been granted temporary asylum in Russia and was freed from detention on Tuesday evening, Izvestia reports with reference to Zinchenko's lawyer Illarion Vasyliev.
“The prosecutors have decided to free [Zinchenko] due to the expiration of the 6-month time limit during which a suspect can be held in custody, as the crime with which Zinchenko has been charged is not very serious. In addition, the Federal Migration Service department for Moscow has granted him temporary asylum, which rules out extradition in itself,” Vasyliev told Izvestia.
The defense has been asking to grant Zinchenko asylum since the moment he was arrested, but the decision was made only now, Vasyliev said. “It looks like the Federal Migration Service department and the prosecutors have been coordinating their actions all this time,” he said.
Izvestia reports that Ukrainian law enforcement have accused Zinchenko of attacking Chornovol, a Maidan activist, a journalist, and currently a Ukrainian government commissioner on anti-corruption policy. However, the suspect himself believes he has fallen victim to “a big political game” along with tens of thousands of other Ukrainians.
The newspaper reports that Chornovol’s car collided with a Porsche on a highway between Kyiv and the Boryspil airport on Dec. 25. Two people from Porsche supposedly beat her. Three days later, five people suspected of beating the journalist were found and arrested, and Zinchenko, who, according to the investigation, was driving the Porsche, was declared internationally wanted.
Zinchenko suggested that some “big shots” stand behind the attack on Chornovol, but those who actually committed the crime came too much into the spotlight and had to sidelined. He also claimed that he and his friend Roman had been urged to take on the blame for a fee of $25,000 and assistance of good lawyers.
“My friend agreed, took the money, and gave himself and Andrei in. He managed to flee to Russia with assistance from his friends, football fans. At the same time, those who ordered this and police grilled his mom in Dnipropetrovsk,” lawyer Vasyliev said.
Meanwhile, Chornovol’s career has skyrocketed after the incident, Izvestia said. During the events on Maidan, she became one of its leaders and took part in the ransacking of the Party of Regions office. Before this, she was known as an ardent activist of the UNA-UNSO party, a nationalistic organization incorporated in Right Sector. Chornovol was recently appointed a government commissioner for anti-corruption policy.
The Ukrainian law enforcement agencies have re-qualified the criminal case dealing with the attack on Chornovol as “assassination attempt.”
A Russian-Ukrainian intergovernmental agreement on the extradition of criminals and suspects is still valid, an Interior Ministry source told the newspaper.
“We have always exchanged operational information with our partners and conducted joint special operations. And this cooperation is continuing even now – surely, if the matter concerns regular crimes rather than affairs in which politics is involved. And there is clearly too much politics in Zinchenko’s case. When it became obvious, the investigation decided to free him,” the source said.
