(AP) – Ukraine’s former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko said the Supreme Court had canceled decade-old criminal cases against her and her family – a victory for the charismatic politician who aims to get her job back in spring elections.
“This finally brings this to an end,” she said Nov. 19. Tymoshenko was a key figure in last year’s Orange Revolution, but was fired as prime minister in September after a split with one-time ally President Viktor Yushchenko.
The criminal cases against the former energy executive began in 1995, and continued to accumulate in 2001 after she had a falling-out with former President Leonid Kuchma and was ousted from his government.
She and other family members were jailed briefly on charges of bribery, money-laundering, corruption and abuse of power.
“It is absolutely clear that none of these charges had any basis; it’s absolutely clear that this was political repression,” Tymoshenko told journalists on Nov. 19, as she sat beside her husband, Oleksandr, father-in-law, Gennadiy, and other supporters.
“We all suffered through this … but I’m proud of us and our supporters. We weren’t broken,” said Tymoshenko’s husband, who went into hiding after being put on the wanted list in 2003. He said he spent the time in Ukraine and was recognized on the streets.
“But the people didn’t surrender him,” Yulia Tymoshenko said.
Interpol removed Oleksandr Tymoshenko’s name from its list in January.
Tymoshenko showed reporters the court order canceling all the criminal cases. The Supreme Court could not be contacted for comment Nov. 19.
Cancellation of the cases is a victory for Tymoshenko, who hopes to lead her party to victory in March parliamentary elections. Political reforms due to take effect in January mean that the winning party in those elections will have the key say in who becomes the nation’s next prime minister – a job that Tymoshenko still openly covets.
Recent opinion polls suggest that none of the three main blocs – Yushchenko’s, Tymoshenko’s and that led by losing presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych – will win enough votes to form a majority on their own.
Tymoshenko has said she hopes to form a coalition with Yushchenko, but insisted that she would not make a concession, such as yielding the prime minister’s job. Both former allies share a pro-Western outlook, in contrast to Yanukovych’s Russian-leaning sympathies, but personal rivalries have come between them.
Yushchenko’s party has also said it would support a coalition with Tymoshenko, and preliminary talks got under way Nov. 19.
“It is becoming clear that the election will be about who becomes prime minister,” she said. “The people will chose. It won’t be a decision made behind-the-scenes.”
Tymoshenko, meanwhile, confirmed that she plans to participate in Tuesday’s celebrations marking the anniversary of last year’s Orange Revolution. “I couldn’t not be on the square,” said Tymoshenko, who played a key role in keeping up morale during last year’s election fraud protests.
