Detained Ukrainian opposition leader testifies against ex-president

The Ukrainian Security Service

(SBU) has published a video in which captured Ukrainian opposition leader Viktor Medvedchuk testifies against former president Petro Poroshenko, accusing him of privatizing a fuel pipeline and conducting business with the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Lugansk during his time in office.

The two men are the most significant political rivals to incumbent President Volodomyr Zelensky.

Medvedchuk, the leader of Ukraine’s second-largest party, ‘Opposition Platform – For Life’, was detained by the SBU on April 12 after being charged with treason. His group, along with other opposition parties in Ukraine, has been banned by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for “collaborating with Russia” and engaging in “anti-Ukrainian” activities, such as opposing the government's policies on Western integration.

In the video, published by the SBU on Monday, Medvedchuk states that he was personally asked by Poroshenko to establish a backchannel to the Russian leadership, which was required to push decisions through various institutions and agencies in order to privatize the Ukrainian section of the Samara-Western Direction fuel pipeline, which stretches from Russia and Belarus to Ukraine and westward to the EU. It was at one point dubbed the ‘Medvedchuk pipeline’.

“I started to work on the pipeline at the request of Poroshenko. If someone had said this was ‘Poroshenko’s pipeline’, that would have been more suitable. And it’s not because I now want to justify myself. In 2016, then-president Poroshenko turned to me with a request, taking into account my contacts and relationship with the leadership of the Russian Federation, asking to assist in the purchase of the pipeline or its owner PrykarpatZapadTrans,” Medvedchuk said.

He explained that, in order to privatize the pipeline and essentially make it Poroshenko’s property, a number of steps had to be taken.

“Courts, prosecutors, the Antitrust Committee, State property Funds – all these ruled in favor of president Poroshenko’s private interests,” stated the opposition leader, adding that the deal allegedly cost the former president $23 million, which he paid through fictitious contracts, but earned its owners twice that amount in one year, as much as $42 million.

As one piece of evidence that the pipeline actually belonged to Poroshenko, Medvedchuk points to the fact that all diesel transfers through the facility ceased in May 2019, right after Poroshenko’s term ended.

Medvedchuk also told the SBU that, in the period between 2014 and 2015, essentially all of Ukraine’s top leadership was involved in a scheme to supply the country with coal purchased from the breakaway Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR), which authorities in Kiev now consider to have been state treason, involving fraud and the financing of terrorism.

“The entire senior leadership of the state was involved in this (scheme): from the president and cabinet ministers, to law enforcement and the people, who were directly involved in making it all work,” the arrested MP said.

According to the SBU, Medvedchuk provided all the names of senior officials who were involved in the scheme and the list reportedly includes former bureaucrats, central bankers, MPs, and law enforcement officials.

Poroshenko’s lawyers have responded to these accusations by stating that the testimony of Medvedchuk has nothing in common with reality and accused the SBU of engaging in PR.

“In our opinion, in general, what the SBU does is exclusively PR. Firstly, this is not their business, this should be done by the SBI (State Bureau of Investigations). And the fact that this is being reported by the SBU confirms that there is nothing here to do with truth or law,” Poroshenko’s attorney stressed.

Authorities in Kiev charged Poroshenko with treason back in December 2021 for allegedly illegally buying coal from the Donbass and thus funding terrorism. After having previously left the country, the former president returned to Ukraine in January to face the charges, which he claimed were politically motivated, and accused Zelensky of using them to distract the country from his administration’s failing policies.

https://www.rt.com/news/555968-ukraine-medvedchuk-against-poroshenko/

23 May, 2022 18:52

Poland has eyes on Western Ukraine – Belarus

Poland and NATO are plotting a takeover of Western Ukraine and Belarus, the Belarusian president claims

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has expressed concern over alleged attempts by Western countries to “dismember” Ukraine amid Russia’s ongoing military operation in the country.

During a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in Sochi on Monday, Lukashenko claimed that both himself and his host were concerned by the behavior of some Polish and NATO politicians. He especially cited the US-led military bloc's move to concentrate troops on the western borders of the Union State of Russia and Belarus.

“The politicians are taking steps to dismember Ukraine. We are worried that they, the Poles and NATO members, are ready to come out, to ‘help’ in this way, to take away, as before 1939, Western Ukraine,” the Belarusian president said.

In his opinion, the West has “a similar strategy” when it comes to Western Belarus. He didn't offer evidence to back up the assertion.

“We are keeping our ears open,” Lukashenko said, emphasizing his belief that at some point Kiev may need Moscow and Minsk’s help to save Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

On Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that Polish citizens would be granted a special legal status in his country, saying that “mentally, the Ukrainian and Polish people have been inseparable for a long time.” The news followed remarks by Polish President Andrzej Duda, who expressed hope that in the future there would be no borders between Poland and Ukraine.

Speaking at the summit of the Collective Security Treaty Organization – a Eurasian military alliance consisting of several former Soviet republics – earlier this month, Lukashenko said that the “attempts to dismember Ukraine” represent “the most dangerous trend in Ukraine today.” He also said that “thousands-strong units have already been created in order to enter Ukraine under the guise of peacekeepers.”

He claimed that the West wanted to not only “weaken Russia as much as possible” but also to make the conflict “blaze wider.”

“If this is the idea, then probably no one will be able to sit aside,” he said.

Lukashenko’s warnings about Warsaw’s alleged intention to reclaim the part of Ukraine which belonged to Poland before it was re-assigned to the Soviet Union in 1939 echoed remarks made by Director of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Sergey Naryshkin. Last month, he said that Poland might be plotting with the US to occupy western Ukraine with “peacekeepers” under the guise of military exercises. Warsaw has vehemently denied such claims.

“Russia’s intelligence chief is spreading insinuations against Poland and the US, convincing falsely that both countries are preparing ‘a Polish annexation of western Ukraine’,” Stanislaw Zaryn, the spokesperson of the Minister-Special Services Coordinator, said.

https://www.rt.com/russia/555980-west-belarus-dismember-ukraine/