Ukraine Keeps Tymoshenko in Custody as US, EU Voice Concerns

A Ukrainian court ruled to keep former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko in custody during her trial, amid concern by the US and the European Union and street protests by her supporters, Bloomberg reports.

The District Court in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, rejected a request by Tymoshenko’s lawyer Yuriy Sukhov to release her on bail, Natalia Lysova, a spokesperson for the former premier, said by phone today. Judge Rodion Kireyev earlier turned down an appeal to release Tymoshenko.

Tymoshenko was arrested Aug. 5 after Kireyev ruled that she had violated court rules and sought to obstruct her trial, in which prosecutors claim that her government agreed to pay too much to buy Russian natural gas in 2009. Tymoshenko says President Viktor Yanukovych engineered the case to silence his opposition before elections next year.

“The US shares those concerns and urges that Mrs. Tymoshenko’s incarceration be reviewed and consideration be given to her immediate release,” according to an Aug. 6 statement on the website of the US Embassy in Kiev, which requested access to the former premier.

The EU, which Ukraine wants to join and with which the former Soviet state seeks to sign the Association Agreement this year, is “extremely concerned” by the arrest, Catherine Ashton, the EU’s foreign policy chief and Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule said in an Aug. 6 statement.

“Events are therefore a cause for concern about the state of the rule of law in Ukraine,” they wrote.

Tymoshenko, 50, has been at odds with Yanukovych since 2004, when she helped lead the Orange Revolution that overturned his victory in presidential elections. She was ordered not to leave Ukraine in December during a separate investigation into the sale of emissions permits to Japan in 2009.

Tymoshenko’s supporters announced Aug. 5 protests near the court, which is on Kiev’s main street Khreshchatyk, and set up tents there.