The U.S. State Department, in its Dec. 27 briefing in Washington, D.C., by Mark C. Toner, urged President Viktor Yanukovych to free ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and other former government officials from prison.

Toner opened the briefing by saying:

"The United States was disappointed that the Kyiv Court of Appeals upheld the conviction of former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko on Dec. 23 and did not address concerns about democracy and rule of law raised in the initial trial and sentencing. We urge the government of Ukraine to free Mrs. Tymoshenko and the other former government officials currently in detention. We believe that they should have an unrestricted ability to participate fully in political life, including next year’s parliamentary elections."

Tymoshenko was convicted on Oct. 11 of abuse of her authority as prime minister in reaching a 2009 deal with Russia that ended a three-week standoff and shutoff of natural gas supplies by Russian state-owned Gazprom.

The court proceedings have been internationally derided as a "show trial" designed to prevent Tymoshenko from running for political office. She is the strongest rival to Yanukovych. A recent poll by the Razumkov think tank in kyiv shows that the president's rating has fallen below hers. Tymoshenko came within 3.5 percentage points of defeating Yanukovych in the 2010 presidential election.

Several members of Tymoshenko's government remain jailed in pretrial detention centers on charges also seen as politically motivated. Besides Tymoshenko, ex-Interior Ministery Yuriy Lutsenko remains in jail on a charge of misspending state money involving overpayments to his driver. Lutsenko has denounced the charges as ludicrous and says the persecution of him and Tymoshenko is designed by some in Yanukovych's camp to derail the nation's European Union integration.

Yanukovych has said that he has no influence on Ukraine's judicial system and cannot interfere in court verdicts.


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