Ukraine’s Tymoshenko refuses to attend tax trial: daughter
By Olzhas Auyezov
KYIV (Reuters) – Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has refused to attend a tax evasion and embezzlement trial due to restart this week, her daughter said on Monday.
Tymoshenko, the main political foe of President Viktor Yanukovich, was sentenced to seven years in prison last October for abuse of office, a case that the European Union condemned as selective justice.
She is now trying to get that verdict overturned by the European Court for Human Rights (EHCR) which plans to hold a public hearing on her case on Aug 28.
But a second conviction could keep Tymoshenko behind bars even if the EHCR eventually rules in her favor.
“They (the authorities) want a second verdict before the ruling of the European Court for Human Rights,” Evgenia Tymoshenko told Reuters at her mother’s party headquarters.
Tymoshenko, who was moved from prison to a state-run clinic in May for treatment for a chronic back problem, has refused to attend all the previous hearings in the new trial.
Tymoshenko has also refused to take part in the hearings through video link, something allowed by a bill that Yanukovich signed this month [ID:nL6E8J9AG0].
The tax evasion and embezzlement charges, which she denies, go back to the 1990s when she ran a major gas trading company.
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