Yulia Tymoshenko: by persecuting former officials the government is diverting public attention from their corrupt doings

By persecuting representatives of the previous government, the authorities are trying to divert public attention from their corrupt deals, says Batkivshchyna Party leader Yulia Tymoshenko.

"The new government is fighting corruption by saying that the ‘main corrupter’ is Tymoshenko and her ministers, who ‘looted’ the country, and now the new government is forced to raise tariffs for gas, heat, water, and everything else," Yulia Tymoshenko said today while appearing as a guest on a program on the Ukraina Channel.

She also claims that now that the judicial branch is subordinate to the Presidential Administration, it will be impossible for representatives of her government to prove their innocence. "Today, do you have where to go? Can we win in court against the current officials and prove that we’re honest and didn’t do what they’re accusing us of? No, we can’t! And I don’t have to prove this. The judges aren’t here. There is only one judge, and we will have to face the music there, not before these officials."

Yulia Tymoshenko recalled that former Minister of Economy Bohdan Danylyshyn is being charged with carrying out the government decision that allowed for the purchase of petroleum products for the Ministry of Defense directly from a state producer – the Kremenchuk Oil Refinery Plant – rather than wholesalers. "They want to permanently scare all honest officials in Ukraine into not working against powerful oligarchic corporations. Cross them and take something from them and you’ll all sit in jail."

"There are many goals behind these persecutions. It’s not just to paint us as being corrupt, but to show that today there’s an "honest" government and "honest" president. It’s to intimidate all my teammates so that they run and prostrate themselves before the Party of Regions. They want to deal with everyone who was closest to me. It’s not just politics. It’s politics in its worst form. Tests such as these harden real fighters. Not everyone survives – some people fall apart. I want people who don’t fall apart to remain with me."