The Kyiv Court of Appeal on Dec. 22 delayed a hearing on house arrest for ex-Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili until Jan. 3.
The court said that the prosecutors had so far failed to submit necessary documents for the hearing.
Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko has accused Saakashvili of accepting funding from fugitive oligarch Serhiy Kurchenko, an ally of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych, to finance anti-government demonstrations and plot a coup d’etat.
Saakashvili, who was arrested on Dec. 8, believes the case to be a political vendetta by President Petro Poroshenko. The alleged evidence against Saakashvili presented by prosecutors has been dismissed by independent lawyers as very weak, and he was released by Pechersk Court Judge Larysa Tsokol on Dec. 11.
Dozens of Saakashvili’s supporters and dozens of journalists attended the Dec. 22 hearing.
Saakashvili argued that the authorities had delayed the hearing to Jan. 3 because they expected protests against his possible house arrest to be less prominent due to the holiday season.
“On Jan. 3 (the judges) are going to make a decision wanted by that the organized crime group that runs Ukraine,” he said. “…I don’t remember this level of lawlessness since the times of Soviet Ukraine.”
Saakashvili also argued that the authorities were planning to fire Judge Tsokol, who released him from custody on Dec. 11, to take revenge on her for that decision.
The High Council of Justice is currently considering two complaints filed against Tsokol in March and April about alleged violations made by her in two criminal cases. The council on Dec. 22 opened an internal probe against Tsokol.
The High Council of Justice claimed that the consideration of complaints against Tsokol was not related to the Saakashvili case.
Tsokol wrote in her decision that the authorities’ attempt to detain Saakashvili without a court warrant on Dec. 5 was unlawful and could not be considered a legal detention. He was later released by hundreds of his supporters on the same day.
“Some of you released me,” Saakashvili told his supporters. “Judge Tsokol not only said that you are not criminals – and Lutsenko lied that you are – but de facto Saakashvili was not detained. That is, it was a kidnapping. I was kidnapped, people released me, and Lutsenko and the people who kidnapped me are criminals.”
The judge also referred to contradictory testimony allegedly given by unidentified Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) agents “Hare” and “Wolf.”
Saakashvili’s lawyer Valeria Kolomiets accused the prosecutors of falsifying and backdating the alleged evidence because the alleged events to which the agents referred as having happened in the past took place after the agents mentioned them, according to the prosecutors’ documents.
Saakashvili also said on Dec. 22 that Poroshenko’s Chief of Staff Ihor Rainin on Dec. 21 had sent a letter to the High Council of Justice asking it to liquidate the Pechersk Court and argued that it was also part of the authorities’ vendetta against Tsokol’s decision.
“He tells them ‘unless you arrest Saakashvili, you’re all fired’,” Saakashvili said. “I’ve never seen such a blatant violation of the rule of law even in dictatorial regimes.”
The High Council of Justice confirmed that the Presidential Administration had asked the council to liquidate the Pechersk Court and other courts as part of the judicial reform but denied any links to the Saakashvili case.
Meanwhile, Kyiv Court of Appeal Judge Oleh Prysyazhnyuk, who will preside over the Jan. 3 hearing on Saakashvili’s house arrest, has a controversial background.
In 2012 Prysyazhnyuk upheld the verdict in the criminal case against Lutsenko, then an opposition politician under Yanukovych. Lutsenko was jailed for four years for alleged embezzlement and abuse of office while he was Ukraine’s interior minister and was released in April 2013 after being pardoned.
The Lutsenko case has been recognized as political by Ukrainian and European authorities.
David Sakvarelidze, a Saakashvili ally, said on Dec. 17 that he believes Lutsenko would use Prysyazhnyuk’s background to pressure him in the Saakashvili case.
“According to our information, Lutsenko gave an ultimatum to Prysyazhnyuk: he remembers their story and the way (Lutsenko) was unlawfully tried, and if the judge wants it to be forgotten and not to have any consequences, he must make a decision demanded by Poroshenko’s regime,” Sakvarelidze said.
Lutsenko and Poroshenko have denied having a political motive in the Saakashvili case.
In April Prysyazhnyuk released riot police officer Vitaly Honcharenko, who has been charged with murdering EuroMaidan protesters, from custody, and Honcharenko fled to Russia.
In the same month, Prysyazhnyuk ruled to return State Fiscal Service Chief Roman Nasirov’s passports and other documents, which had previously been seized to prevent him from fleeing. Nasirov is a suspect in a major graft case.
Prysyazhnyuk’s asset declaration appears to be at odds with his modest salary. He owns two houses, three apartments, two cars and 7,500 square meters of land, while his job pays him $13,000 a year.
Saakashvili’s lawyer Ruslan Chernolutsky also said on Dec. 22 that Ukrainian authorities might try to illegally deport or extradite him from Ukraine by the end of this year, with a court hearing related to the issue and the completion of an extradition check scheduled for the upcoming week.
Under Ukrainian law, Saakashvili cannot be deported or extradited because he is a permanent stateless resident of Ukraine and an applicant for asylum status, because he is a suspect in a criminal case and because Ukraine has already rejected Georgia’s previous extradition requests for him as politically motivated, his lawyers argued.
