Former Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko is convinced the former
President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko has reached a deal with the
ruling government to cover up his role in the 2009 gas crisis.
"The Prosecutor General’s Office under Yanukovych ‘protection’ gave
their ally Yushchenko freedom and the opportunity to mask his role in
the 2009 gas catastrophe. While testifying in court yesterday,
Yushchenko once against spat on those who made him president," Yuriy
Lutsenko said Thursday during his trial, according to the official website of Yulia Tymoshenko.
The ex-minister said that earlier this year he wrote a letter to
Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka stating that ex-President Viktor
Yushchenko had committed a crime, but has yet to receive a response.
"According to the Constitution, the president doesn’t have the right to
recall the head of a independent business entity from international
negotiations. But Yushchenko did this," sad Yuriy Lutsenko.
"And now Yushchenko is covering up and saying that he never withdrew
anyone from the talks, because this was 100 percent abuse of power on
his part," said the ex-minister.
He said that during the 2009 gas crisis, Yulia Tymoshenko "was
forced to rescue the situation when Yushchenko put Ukraine on the brink
of collapse." "Tymoshenko went to the Kremlin to negotiate gas
contracts, while Yushchenko went skiing, leaving the country to
Tymoshenko at a time when the Kremlin was most furious over the
breakdown of gas talks," said the ex-minister, adding that Premier Yulia
Tymoshenko acted within her authority in the situation and didn’t break
any laws.
In his testimony, Oleh Dubyna, the former head of Naftohaz, said
that former President Viktor Yushchenko had instructed him to walk out
of the negotiation in Moscow, even though the price that had been agreed
was reasonable.
Yesterday, however, when Viktor Yushchenko finally came to court
after ignoring numerous summonses, he said that he never recalled the
Naftohaz delegation from the negotiations in Russia.
Архiв
