This is one international dispute that is getting nasty, personal and salacious.
This is one international dispute that is getting nasty, personal and salacious.
One of Femen’s lead activists made a “topless attack” on Elmer Brok, the
chairman of the European Parliament’s foreign relations committee. The incident
happened in Brussels on March 21, five days after Renat Kuzmin, Ukraine’s No. 2
prosecutor, accused Brok of cavorting in Kyiv “accompanied by escort girls and
large volumes of alcohol at a nightclub in Kyiv’s Troeshchyna (neighborhood).”
Kuzmin made the accusations in a long opinion piece published March 16
by Law and Business Weekly in which he equated criticism with libel and
defamation and called for such speech to be punishable as a crime.
The whole ruckus raised questions within the European Union about
whether Brok is being targeted for his strong condemnation of the conviction
and imprisonment of ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, a legal campaign waged
vigorously by Kuzmin but derided in the West as political persecution and
selective application of justice.
A statement by the European Union delegation to Ukraine identified the
Femen activist who attacked Brok in the European Parliament as Alexandra
Shevchenko. She is one of the most visible members of the group whose trademark
is to protest topless against foreigners who hire Ukrainian women for sex,
among other issues.
The statement called Kuzmin’s accusations false.
“In reality, during his one-day visit to Kyiv on Dec.
20, member of the European Parliament Elmar Brok had an intensive agenda which
included a number of meetings with Ukrainian authorities namely with Prime
Minister of Ukraine Mykola Azarov and chair of the Verkhovna Rada Volodymyr
Rybak as well as meetings with the representatives of the opposition political
parties. During his meetings, Mr. Brok was assisted by the head and staff of
the Delegation of the European Union to Ukraine who accompanied him all the
time from the moment of his arrival from Moscow until his departure in the
evening of the same day, 20 December, to Tbilisi.”
Brok also issued a statement saying “the accusations made by Mr. Kuzmin
are totally unfounded.”
Brok connected the attack on him and the accusations to his
attempts to win the freedom of Tymoshenko and other opposition leaders,
including former Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko. The imprisonment of
Tymoshenko and Lutsenko have been strongly condemned in the West and have
caused Ukraine’s relations with the EU to deteriorate to such a point that the
signing of a free trade agreement and political association agreement this year
are doubtful.
“Mr. Kuzmin and his friends
cannot stop me from working against selective justice and for the freedom of
opposition as leaders, for Mrs. Tymoshenko and Mr. Lutsenko in Ukraine.”
A video of the assault by a Femen
activist on Brok can be viewed here: http://ua.korrespondent.net/world/1529637-ogolena-aktivistka-femen-napala-na-chlena-evroparlamentu
Kyiv Post
chief editor Brian Bonner can be reached at [email protected].
