The Ukrainian high court on Wednesday dismissed an appeal filed by jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko in a move that was denounced by the European Union.
With the ruling, Tymoshenko will now be forced to serve out her seven-year sentence for a conviction handed down last year over corruption charges relating to a gas deal with Russia when she was prime minister. Her supporters and Western powers have denounced her trial and sentencing as a sham that serves to strengthen her opponent Viktor Yanukovych’s rule over Ukraine.
“The panel of judges found the appeal unjustified,” Judge Oleksandr Yelfimov said, reading the court’s ruling aloud, according to Interfax Ukraine.
Her lawyers asked the court to acquit her and close the case against her because of a lack of evidence. Prosecutors told the judges that she should serve out her sentence.
Tymoshenko is considered the main driving force behind the 2004 “Orange Revolution” that widely promoted democracy in the country. She ran for president and lost to Yanukovych, but her popularity remained high among Ukrainians.
Eugenia Tymoshenko, her daughter, said that there is no more hope that her mother will receive a fair hearing in Ukraine, according to a statement published on the former opposition leader’s website.
“Today we obtained a disgraceful verdict, which again proves that a dictatorship has been established in Ukraine. We won’t stop fighting,” the younger Tymoshenko said, adding that a legal team will submit a complaint to the European Court of Human Rights.
With Wednesday’s court decision, many believe Ukraine is going down a path where the rule of law is subverted.
The European Union called on Ukraine to enact reforms to its judicial system following the court ruling, saying Tymoshenko’s trial did not make the grade.
Her trial “did not respect international standards as regards fair, transparent and independent legal processes,” European Union High Representative Catherine Ashton and Commissioner Stefan Füle said in a joint statement Wednesday.
The country’s vice prime minister, Sergei Tigipko, insisted that Tymoshenko’s sentencing was fair.
“It is clear to us there is a clear violation,” he told the Daily Telegraph in an interview, adding that Tymoshenko was most assuredly guilty for signing the gas deal. “This was a criminal case, not a political case.”
Tigipko added that the gas deal cost Ukraine $6 billion last year.
“We have the most expensive gas in Europe because of this, and we are not the richest country in Europe,” he said.
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