Verkhovna Rada Chairman Andriy Parubiy has called on the world community to condemn the verdict against Ukrainian journalist Roman Sushchenko, which was issued in Moscow on June 4.
“I call on our allies, politicians from all over the world and international organizations to condemn the pseudo-sentence to journalist Roman Sushchenko,” Parubiy said while opening a plenary meeting of the Verkhovna Rada on June 5.
He urged the world community to seek from Russia the release of all Ukrainian citizens, political prisoners of Russia.
He said that Ukraine would never recognize “this trial and this pseudo-sentence.”
Parubiy also urged Ukrainian citizens to refrain from trips to Russia, “because there is a real danger of being captured by Russian special services.”
On October 3, 2016, the FSB announced that the Ukrainian had been arrested on espionage charges. The FSB said he had been a colonel in the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s main intelligence directorate.
Sushchenko, who had lived in France for six years, working as a Paris correspondent for the Ukrinform news agency, had repeatedly visited Russia, and at the time of his arrest was there for personal reasons. He has relatives in Russia.
On June 4, the Moscow City Court sentenced Sushchenko to 12 years in a high-security penal colony.
