Court convicts Ukraine's former prime minister

Πηγή: CNN
Oct 11 2011


(CNN) -- A Ukraine court has found former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko guilty of abuse of authority for signing gas contracts with Russia and sentenced her Tuesday to seven years in prison.

Authorities deployed hundreds of police officers around the court to keep order, state media reported. Dozens of angry Tymoshenko supporters took to the streets of Kiev in August when she was taken into custody.

"Dear friends, I just want to say that I disagree with this verdict and I am saying that the year 1937 is back again," Tymoshenko said in the courtroom on Tuesday, making a reference to Josef Stalin's rule when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union.

But Judge Rodion Kireev said that "bearing in mind the fact that the court has not established any circumstances aggravating or mitigating Tymoshenko's punishment, and given the heightened social danger of the crime committed by Tymoshenko, her personality and the absence of any penitence on her part, the court sees no grounds to hand down a more lenient sentence."

In April, the Ukraine's Prosecutor General's office opened a criminal case charging Tymoshenko with signing overpriced gas deals with Russian energy provider Gazprom that inflicted damages to the country of more than 1.5 billion hryvnas (almost $190 million at the current exchange rate) and which Tymoshenko had allegedly no right to sign.

Tymoshenko repeatedly brushed off all charges against her as political, calling the trial a "farce" and naming the judge a "stooge of (President Viktor) Yanukovych's administration" appointed to "fabricate" the case.

But the court ruled Timoshenko must repay the money and she is banned from holding public office for three years.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said the nation's 2009 natural gas agreements with Ukraine were legal.

"We follow the principle that (Yulia) Tymoshenko's trial must be fair and unbiased and meet all of the requirements of Ukrainian legislation, with the possibility of defense and compliance with the fundamental humanitarian standards and rules," according to a ministry statement.

Tymoshenko narrowly lost to Yanukovych in a presidential election in February 2010, and she became his fiercest opponent.