The Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine is planning to question former Ukrainian Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko after his release from prison in the United States in 2012, Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka has said live on the 1+1 television channel.

"A criminal case has been opened against Pavlo Lazarenko in Ukraine, and after he is released, we would like him to speak with Ukrainian investigators," he said, UKRINFORM reports.

Pshonka added that the Prosecutor General's Office and the U.S. side had discussed the possibility of interrogating Lazarenko in the United States, but this could not be done.

Earlier this year, the Ukrainian Justice Ministry stated its intention to ensure legal support for the case to return the funds illegally withdrawn from Ukraine by the former prime minister.

As UKRINFORM reported, Lazarenko, who served as Ukraine's first deputy prime minister in 1995-1996 and as prime minister in 1996-1997, was stripped of deputy immunity in February 1999 and called to account by the Prosecutor General's Office for large-scale embezzlement and other offenses.

In February 1999, Lazarenko was detained at New York airport with a passport of a citizen of Panama - for attempting to illegally enter U.S. territory. The detainee asked U.S. authorities for political asylum, but he was charged with the laundering of money illegally obtained and transferred to overseas accounts in 1994-1999.

In November 2009, a final sentence on Lazarenkowas passed. He was sentenced to 97 months in prison.

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