Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze has said she is convinced that the situation with the arrest of unaffiliated MP Nadiya Savchenko will not affect Ukraine if it stays in the legal field.
“I am sure that it is very important to us that the investigation proceeds in accordance with the rule of law. If this process is clear and corresponds to the law, I think that this situation will not influence Ukraine in any negative way,” she told reporters after a press briefing entitled “Current Challenges in Implementation of the Association Agreement: Implementation of the Action Plan for 2018” in Kyiv on March 26.
According to Klympush-Tsintsadze, the Ukrainian side will have to explain to international partners for some time what really happened in the situation with Savchenko.
On March 23, the Shevchenkivsky District Court of Kyiv ruled to select a preventive measure for Ukrainian MP Nadiia Savchenko in the form of detention for 59 days, until May 20, 2018.
Though Judge Yevhen Sydorov found Savchenko’s detention on March 22, 2018 to be groundless, he chose to put her in custody without a bail option as a preventive measure.
The MP’s defense lawyer told journalists the defense intends to appeal the chosen measure of restraint on Monday, March 26.
On March 15, Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko submitted motions to the Verkhovna Rada on granting consent to the prosecution, detention, and arrest of Ukrainian MP Nadiia Savchenko.
On March 22, the Verkhovna Rada supported the motions and greenlighted Savchenko’s prosecution, detention, and arrest. Then representatives of law enforcement bodies in the building of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine informed Savchenko about suspicion, after which the MP, accompanied by law enforcers, went to the Office of the Security Service of Ukraine in Kyiv and Kyiv region.
The motions were filed in the framework of criminal proceedings under Part 1 of Article 109 (actions aimed at the forcible change or overthrow of the constitutional order or the seizure of state power); Part 1 of Article 14 (preparation for crime), Part 2 of Article 28 (commission of a crime by a group of persons, a group of persons by prior agreement, an organized group or a criminal organization), Part 1 of Article 109; Part 1 of Article 14, Part 2 of Article 28, Article 112 (encroachment on the life of a state or public figure), Part 1 of Article 14, Part 3 of Article 258 (terrorist act); Part 1 of Article 258-3 (creation of a terrorist group or terrorist organization); Part 2 of Article 28 and Part 1 of Article 263 (illegal handling of weapons, ammunition or explosives) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
