Yushchenko and Tymoshenko During Orange Revolution

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Yushchenko and Tymoshenko During Orange Revolution

An Ukrainian court of appeals declined to hear the appeal formulated by former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko by which she was challenging the arrest sentence for contempt of court passed by another court last Friday. Judge Olga Yefimova ruled that the detention of the former PM was not subject to an appeal because preventive measures cannot be challenged under criminal law.
Following into the steps that put Tymoshenko behind bars in the first place, the lawyer said that the decision of the court was “absurd” and announced that his client would appeal the Supreme Court of Ukraine and the European Court for Human Rights.
Yulia Tymoshenko, 50, former prime minister of Ukraine, was charged with abuse of power as she is said to have determined the national gas company of Ukraine to sign a contract with Russian Gazprom, though she had no prerogative to do so. The contract is said to have caused Ukraine to lose a serious amount of money.
The case against Tymoshenko was launched in June as the former PM kept on denying accusations. She claimed that the case was political, and was meant to prevent her from running for the presidential elections. Even tough she is not the only one involved in it.
Last Friday, Tymoshenko was brought to court where she was held in contempt of court, after telling the judge that he was a “puppet” into the hands of incumbent president Viktor Yanushevych, and, when asked to address the judge with “Your Honor,” she replied that the honor must first be deserved.
As a result, the judge order her arrest and she was thus incarcerated for contempt of the court and for obstructing justice.
On Monday, a court rejected her appeal against the detention and upheld the previous sentence passed on Friday. Tymoshenko appeared in court tired, but did not complain about detention conditions.
Thousands of people gathered in Kiev to protest against her incarceration, but the numbers were far smaller than those of the people who participated in what came to be coined as “Orange Revolution,” when the people protested rigged election and helped Tymoshenko and her political friend Viktor Yushchenko come to power.

Viktor Yanukovych

Their coming to power in Ukraine was seen as an extraordinary step for the former Soviet country, as Tymoshenko and Yushchenko were promising Ukraine, one of the largest countries in Europe, that the Soviet past will be put behind and an European path would open.
The rule of Tymoshenko and Yushchenko was one of continuing bickering within the Orange coalition, of oversized corruption and nationalistic stance that made the country remain paralyzed and lose even more on the economic and political field.
At the end of this regime, Yushchenko scored 6 percent of the votes in the elections, and Tymoshenko went into runoffs with Viktor  Yanukovych, the leader of the Regions Party, a Russian politician that became the new president of Ukraine, not before Tymoshenko made another round of accusations that the elections were tempered with.
Yanukovych’s reign is dominated by a closer alliance with Russia, but also by efforts to sign by the end of this year an EU-Ukraine association agreement, which is meant to infuriate the regime in Moscow. And if he infuriates Russia with an pro-European view, the next election Tymoshenko could find in the position of arguing in favor of an aliance with Russia, if she wants to win.
The United States warned Ukraine against political use of justice, and so did the European Union, compelling the president of Ukraine to ask himself what would happen in the United States or in European Union if a citizen were to insult a judge in their own court.
It is considered that the arrest of Tymoshenko could prejudice the signing of the European Union-Ukraine association agreement, which is a preliminary step toward the admission of Ukraine to EU, which Tymoshenko promised, and Yanukovych is trying to deliver.
If found guilty, Tymoshenko risks to stay behind bars for up to ten years, but even a suspended sentence could end her political career.

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