Address to International Community and Foreign Media from Civil Committee for Protection the Constitution “Ukraine without Kuchma”
Пятница, 2 февраля 2001, 23:00
Address to International Community and Foreign Media from Civil Committee for Protection the Constitution “Ukraine without Kuchma”
Tensions between democratic opposition and neo-totalitarian regime have aggravated in Ukraine. Power system lead by President Leonid Kuchma fabricates tax persecutions and criminal cases against opposition, terrorizes or closes independent media, assaults and slaughters independent journalists. Georgiy Gongadze case is indicative of a series of illegal actions in investigation of the murder of a well-known political journalist. This case is accompanied by repressions against people who try to say or publish the truth. It has become an illustration to the criminal nature of the regime and caused major political crisis since Ukraine gained its independence.
After a mutilated body was found in a forest nearby Kyiv and identified as a body of Georgiy Gongadze, power institutions have stolen this body from morgue. They have confiscated the documents of the first expertise and annulled its conclusion and, ultimately, have denied the fact of journalist’s death notwithstanding the 99.6% DNA test confirmation of the body identity and a number of other facts, found while conducting a range of tests proving that mutilated body is a body of Mr. Gongadze.
This fear of truth is one more proof of President Kuchma’s and Interior Minister Kravchenko’s involvement into affair with Mr. Gongadze’s disappearance. Information suggesting this was first received from the Georgian Embassy in Kyiv. This information was shortly afterwards confirmed by audio recordings made by Mykola Melnychenko, former officer of the Presidential Guard.
Currently 26 organizations and political parties are members of the Committee for Protection the Constitution “Ukraine without Kuchma”. We appeal to the international community and foreign media to support our resistance to neo-totalitarian state, which is based upon industrial-financial clans. We strive for open civil society. But we can reach our goal only under condition that this regime is put off the power. We hope that your support will come timely, and Mr. Kuchma will not manage to finally suppress the opposition and lead the country on a Belorussian way.
ATTACHEMENT
Brief review of Gongadze case and of Ukrainian political crisis
Georgiy Gongadze was involved in political journalism for about ten years. Since April 2000, he was managing an internet media project called The Ukrainian Truth (UT). He havily criticicized President Kuchma and his retinue oligarchs. Five days prior to his disappearence in September last year he made public evidences of massive falsification of the signatures collected in favor of conducting referendum which was meant to introduce changes in Constitution which Mr. Kuchma aspired to. Back in July 2000 Gongadze appealed to Prosecutor General informing him on threats and shadowing over him by a car with the registration number typical to state institutions. However, Office of the Prosecutor General as an institution dependent on Kuchma made everything possible to make its own investigation ineffectual and to jeopardize the independent investigation. Later Interior Minister Yuriy Kravchenko has acknowledged that the car registration number, mentioned in Gongadze’s letter to Prosecutor general is a number of one of the cars of External Shadowing Service by militia, but, according to Kravchenko this number was stolen a few months earlier.
On September 15, 2000, one day prior to Gongadze’s disappearance another independent journalist Oleh Yeltsov has received threats via telephone with requirement to give up cooperating with Ukrainska Pravda, edited by Gongadze. Yeltsov reported on this to militia, but next day the person who threatened him let Yeltsov know, that this person is aware of Yeltsov’s appeal to militia. The same day, September 16, the journalist noticed militia cars nearby his house. Later in a day while Yeltsov was traveling to Moscow by train militia twice searched him.
Shortly after disappearance of Mr. Gongadze militia detained his friend Edward Lauer Mr. Lauer was illegally detained and interrogated for 10 days and, ultimately, freed with no official charges to him. The text of protocol for interrogation of Mrs. Lesia Gongadze, mother of Mr. Gongadze, a passage on Mr. Gongadze’s debts, which were meant to support criminal version of his disappearence, was inserted, but Mrs. Gongadze refused to sign the document.
On November 3, 2000 in a forest 60 kilometers from Kyiv was found a mutilated body. Investigation authorities were concealing this fact from Mr. Gongadze’s relatives for seven days. Local medical expert Ihor Vorotyntsev conducted the first expertise of the body. After the body was identified by close friends of the journalist as Mr. Gongadze’s body and a date of death was stipulated as the one close to September 16, 2000, the body was illegally taken, actually, stolen, from the local morgue and transported to Kyiv. After this militia searched home of Mr. Vorotyntsev and a clinic he works in and confiscates all the documentation collected by medical expert Vorotyntsev. Mr. Vorotyntsev is made to keep silence on all the information available to him while conclusions of the first expertise have been annulled. Another medical expert, Svitlana Karmeliuk from Kyiv, later in December also stated pressure on part of power bodies.
On November 28, 2000, during the Verkhovna Rada (parliament of Ukraine) session Oleksandr Moroz, Member of the Parliament, makes public audio recordings of the talks by Mr. Kuchma with his Ministers and close aids, which indicates possible involvement of Mr. Kuchma into affair with Mr. Gongadze’s disappearance. A group of the Ukrainian Members’ of the Parliament went abroad to meet retired Major of the State Security Service of Ukraine Mykola Melnychenko, who states that he conducted recordings in Kuchma’s office. On their return home they were illegally searched by custom officers who tried to damage evidences, brought by the MPs from Mr. Melnychenko. For now MPs Taras Chornovil, Oleksandr Turchynov and Mykhaylo Syrota confirmed that the tapes by Melnychenko contain real talks and they are prepared to testify this to the court.
Only January 10, 2001, after a huge delay results of the twelve officially conducted body expertise, particularly DNA test, were made public. DNA test 99.6% proved that the decapitated body is the body of Mr. Gongadze. Combined with the results of other expertise, i. e. wounds received during the war in Georgia, traumas received while Mr. Gongadze was still alive, jewelry found with a body it can be 100% stated that the found body is the body of Mr. Gongadze.
Meanwhile, Prosecutor General refuses to acknowledge the mutilated body a body of Mr. Gongadze, fact and a date of death of a journalist. He also refuses to conduct a further expertise, demanded by Mr. Gongadze’s mother Lesia Gongadze. Both mother of Georgiy Gongadze and his wife Myroslava are refused a status of victim in this case. The lawyer of the Gongadze family was never allowed to become familiar with the materials of the investigation. Even representatives of the international organization “Reporters sans Frontiers” were not allowed to meet the official, who immediately conducts investigatiof of Mr. Gongadze’s case. Appeal of Mrs. Gongadze regarding illegal actions of the Prosecutor General was not even considered by the court!
Numerous violations of law by the power were most obvious in Gongadze case and admitted by the delegations of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and Reporters sans Frontiers. These violations are usual practice of Kuchma’s regime. President and his tycoons with their own “pocket parties” are gaining control over majority of local power bodies, one third of the parliament, as well as all most important TV and radio channels and a bulk of country’s press. By such measure Mr. Kuchma assured his reelection in 1999 and passing of the changes to Constitution on national referendum in year 2000, referendum which was condemned by the PACE and Venetian Commission.
When opposition to confirmation of the referendum decision grew in the parliament, President Kuchma once again referred to manipulations. In January 2001, Mr. Kuchma’s advocates in the regions of Ukraine held meetings with slogans calling to disband the parliament if it fails to confirm changes to Constitution, supported on the referendum. Local authorities by different threats gathered tens of thousands of people for pro-Presidential manifestations, breaching by this their own ban on pickets and meetings during winter holidays.
Currently we are turning to more active action in our protests. Official information web site of the “Ukraine without Kuchma” action is created. Almost in all oblast centres of Ukraine meeting and pickets are being conducted. We are receiving donations from the citizens, disseminating information about our action, placing tent cities (regardless of regular administrative barriers and brutality of militia). On top of this, since February 1, 2001, a march on Kyiv is initiated by the protesters. This march is to support parliamentary opposition.
We demand resignation of the President Kuchma, Interior Minister Kravchenko, Chief of the State Security Service Derkach, Prosecutor General Potebenko, who are the driving forces of the repressive regime. We also demand to conduct a transparent investigation of the murder of journalist Gongadze.
Power is gaining momentum to suppress the opposition. Assaults, shadowing, searches, confiscations and other repressions are being intensified against protesters. We call for you understanding and support. Under present circumstances a resolute support of the foreign media and international community might mean a lot and might bring essential changes. We hope that you will not be deaf to our call and support us in our action against lies, wrongdoing and crime.
Tensions between democratic opposition and neo-totalitarian regime have aggravated in Ukraine. Power system lead by President Leonid Kuchma fabricates tax persecutions and criminal cases against opposition, terrorizes or closes independent media, assaults and slaughters independent journalists. Georgiy Gongadze case is indicative of a series of illegal actions in investigation of the murder of a well-known political journalist. This case is accompanied by repressions against people who try to say or publish the truth. It has become an illustration to the criminal nature of the regime and caused major political crisis since Ukraine gained its independence.
After a mutilated body was found in a forest nearby Kyiv and identified as a body of Georgiy Gongadze, power institutions have stolen this body from morgue. They have confiscated the documents of the first expertise and annulled its conclusion and, ultimately, have denied the fact of journalist’s death notwithstanding the 99.6% DNA test confirmation of the body identity and a number of other facts, found while conducting a range of tests proving that mutilated body is a body of Mr. Gongadze.
This fear of truth is one more proof of President Kuchma’s and Interior Minister Kravchenko’s involvement into affair with Mr. Gongadze’s disappearance. Information suggesting this was first received from the Georgian Embassy in Kyiv. This information was shortly afterwards confirmed by audio recordings made by Mykola Melnychenko, former officer of the Presidential Guard.
Currently 26 organizations and political parties are members of the Committee for Protection the Constitution “Ukraine without Kuchma”. We appeal to the international community and foreign media to support our resistance to neo-totalitarian state, which is based upon industrial-financial clans. We strive for open civil society. But we can reach our goal only under condition that this regime is put off the power. We hope that your support will come timely, and Mr. Kuchma will not manage to finally suppress the opposition and lead the country on a Belorussian way.
ATTACHEMENT
Brief review of Gongadze case and of Ukrainian political crisis
Georgiy Gongadze was involved in political journalism for about ten years. Since April 2000, he was managing an internet media project called The Ukrainian Truth (UT). He havily criticicized President Kuchma and his retinue oligarchs. Five days prior to his disappearence in September last year he made public evidences of massive falsification of the signatures collected in favor of conducting referendum which was meant to introduce changes in Constitution which Mr. Kuchma aspired to. Back in July 2000 Gongadze appealed to Prosecutor General informing him on threats and shadowing over him by a car with the registration number typical to state institutions. However, Office of the Prosecutor General as an institution dependent on Kuchma made everything possible to make its own investigation ineffectual and to jeopardize the independent investigation. Later Interior Minister Yuriy Kravchenko has acknowledged that the car registration number, mentioned in Gongadze’s letter to Prosecutor general is a number of one of the cars of External Shadowing Service by militia, but, according to Kravchenko this number was stolen a few months earlier.
On September 15, 2000, one day prior to Gongadze’s disappearance another independent journalist Oleh Yeltsov has received threats via telephone with requirement to give up cooperating with Ukrainska Pravda, edited by Gongadze. Yeltsov reported on this to militia, but next day the person who threatened him let Yeltsov know, that this person is aware of Yeltsov’s appeal to militia. The same day, September 16, the journalist noticed militia cars nearby his house. Later in a day while Yeltsov was traveling to Moscow by train militia twice searched him.
Shortly after disappearance of Mr. Gongadze militia detained his friend Edward Lauer Mr. Lauer was illegally detained and interrogated for 10 days and, ultimately, freed with no official charges to him. The text of protocol for interrogation of Mrs. Lesia Gongadze, mother of Mr. Gongadze, a passage on Mr. Gongadze’s debts, which were meant to support criminal version of his disappearence, was inserted, but Mrs. Gongadze refused to sign the document.
On November 3, 2000 in a forest 60 kilometers from Kyiv was found a mutilated body. Investigation authorities were concealing this fact from Mr. Gongadze’s relatives for seven days. Local medical expert Ihor Vorotyntsev conducted the first expertise of the body. After the body was identified by close friends of the journalist as Mr. Gongadze’s body and a date of death was stipulated as the one close to September 16, 2000, the body was illegally taken, actually, stolen, from the local morgue and transported to Kyiv. After this militia searched home of Mr. Vorotyntsev and a clinic he works in and confiscates all the documentation collected by medical expert Vorotyntsev. Mr. Vorotyntsev is made to keep silence on all the information available to him while conclusions of the first expertise have been annulled. Another medical expert, Svitlana Karmeliuk from Kyiv, later in December also stated pressure on part of power bodies.
On November 28, 2000, during the Verkhovna Rada (parliament of Ukraine) session Oleksandr Moroz, Member of the Parliament, makes public audio recordings of the talks by Mr. Kuchma with his Ministers and close aids, which indicates possible involvement of Mr. Kuchma into affair with Mr. Gongadze’s disappearance. A group of the Ukrainian Members’ of the Parliament went abroad to meet retired Major of the State Security Service of Ukraine Mykola Melnychenko, who states that he conducted recordings in Kuchma’s office. On their return home they were illegally searched by custom officers who tried to damage evidences, brought by the MPs from Mr. Melnychenko. For now MPs Taras Chornovil, Oleksandr Turchynov and Mykhaylo Syrota confirmed that the tapes by Melnychenko contain real talks and they are prepared to testify this to the court.
Only January 10, 2001, after a huge delay results of the twelve officially conducted body expertise, particularly DNA test, were made public. DNA test 99.6% proved that the decapitated body is the body of Mr. Gongadze. Combined with the results of other expertise, i. e. wounds received during the war in Georgia, traumas received while Mr. Gongadze was still alive, jewelry found with a body it can be 100% stated that the found body is the body of Mr. Gongadze.
Meanwhile, Prosecutor General refuses to acknowledge the mutilated body a body of Mr. Gongadze, fact and a date of death of a journalist. He also refuses to conduct a further expertise, demanded by Mr. Gongadze’s mother Lesia Gongadze. Both mother of Georgiy Gongadze and his wife Myroslava are refused a status of victim in this case. The lawyer of the Gongadze family was never allowed to become familiar with the materials of the investigation. Even representatives of the international organization “Reporters sans Frontiers” were not allowed to meet the official, who immediately conducts investigatiof of Mr. Gongadze’s case. Appeal of Mrs. Gongadze regarding illegal actions of the Prosecutor General was not even considered by the court!
Numerous violations of law by the power were most obvious in Gongadze case and admitted by the delegations of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and Reporters sans Frontiers. These violations are usual practice of Kuchma’s regime. President and his tycoons with their own “pocket parties” are gaining control over majority of local power bodies, one third of the parliament, as well as all most important TV and radio channels and a bulk of country’s press. By such measure Mr. Kuchma assured his reelection in 1999 and passing of the changes to Constitution on national referendum in year 2000, referendum which was condemned by the PACE and Venetian Commission.
When opposition to confirmation of the referendum decision grew in the parliament, President Kuchma once again referred to manipulations. In January 2001, Mr. Kuchma’s advocates in the regions of Ukraine held meetings with slogans calling to disband the parliament if it fails to confirm changes to Constitution, supported on the referendum. Local authorities by different threats gathered tens of thousands of people for pro-Presidential manifestations, breaching by this their own ban on pickets and meetings during winter holidays.
Currently we are turning to more active action in our protests. Official information web site of the “Ukraine without Kuchma” action is created. Almost in all oblast centres of Ukraine meeting and pickets are being conducted. We are receiving donations from the citizens, disseminating information about our action, placing tent cities (regardless of regular administrative barriers and brutality of militia). On top of this, since February 1, 2001, a march on Kyiv is initiated by the protesters. This march is to support parliamentary opposition.
We demand resignation of the President Kuchma, Interior Minister Kravchenko, Chief of the State Security Service Derkach, Prosecutor General Potebenko, who are the driving forces of the repressive regime. We also demand to conduct a transparent investigation of the murder of journalist Gongadze.
Power is gaining momentum to suppress the opposition. Assaults, shadowing, searches, confiscations and other repressions are being intensified against protesters. We call for you understanding and support. Under present circumstances a resolute support of the foreign media and international community might mean a lot and might bring essential changes. We hope that you will not be deaf to our call and support us in our action against lies, wrongdoing and crime.
