Ukraine's High Anti-Corruption Court allows party leader Tymoshenko one-off trip abroad

The High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine has granted Yuliia Tymoshenko, the leader of the Batkivshchyna party, who is suspected of offering bribes to members of parliament, permission to travel abroad to attend an international event in Croatia.

Source: the Anti-Corruption Action Centre on Telegram; a broadcast of the hearing at the High Anti-Corruption Court

Details: The judge partially granted the defence's application to have Tymoshenko's pre-trial restriction changed.

Taking into account an order by the speaker of parliament, the court has permitted Tymoshenko to travel to Zagreb from 27 April to 3 May.

Under the court's ruling, Tymoshenko must return her passport to the authorities within three days of returning to Ukraine.

The Anti-Corruption Action Centre said Tymoshenko told the court that representatives from 65 countries would be attending the event and that she would have the opportunity to "help Ukraine with her contacts".

Tymoshenko also said that she would "never in her life, under any pressure or repression, leave Ukraine or go into hiding".

Background: On 8 April, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO) reported that they had completed their investigation into allegations that Tymoshenko had offered bribes to members of parliament, and had provided the case materials to her lawyers for review.

Previously:

• On the evening of 13 January, NABU and SAPO reported that they had exposed the leader of a Verkhovna Rada faction on corruption charges. Ukrainska Pravda sources indicated that the person in question was Yuliia Tymoshenko.
• On the morning of 14 January, sources in political circles told Ukrainska Pravda that the anti-corruption bodies had served Tymoshenko with a notice of suspicion.
• In audio recordings released by NABU, a person alleged to be Yuliia Tymoshenko can be heard discussing a system of payments for specific votes in the Verkhovna Rada with an unnamed MP.
• Tymoshenko herself described the searches as "a grand PR stunt" and claimed it was a "clear-out of political rivals ahead of elections". The politician asserted that the anti-corruption investigators had "found nothing" and had simply taken her "work phones, parliamentary documents and personal savings, all of which are fully declared in my official asset declaration". She also claimed that the person on the recordings released by the anti-corruption investigators is not her.
• Tymoshenko subsequently said in court that the recordings released by NABU had captured a conversation with Ihor Kopytin, an MP from the Servant of the People party, whom she claims was "carrying out assignments" from NABU in order to compromise her. Kopytyn responded that he does not participate in political games and added that he "consistently supports the anti-corruption policy".

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