Ukraine has officially charged 2 leading pro-Russian lawmakers, including among Russian President Vladimir Putin’s close allies, of high treason, the nation’s leading prosecutor stated Tuesday.
Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Iryna Venedyktova announced that she authorized suspicion versus two members of parliament, whom she determined only as “M and K,” of attempted burglary of natural deposits in annexed Crimea along with treason.
Interfax Ukraine named the two arraigned replacements as Taras Kozak and also opposition event leader Viktor Medvedchuk, a close Putin ally that has claimed the Russian president is his daughter’s godfather. BBC Russian cited its sources as verifying the deputies’ identifications.
The maximum sentence for those condemned of high treason in Ukraine is 15 years behind bars.
Mentioning law enforcement sources, Interfax Ukraine reported that Ukraine’s SBU state safety service has likewise invaded Medvedchuk’s home near Kiev.
The complaints come as ties between Kiev and Moscow– currently in tatters over Russia’s 2014 addition of Crimea and the conflict in eastern Ukraine– tatty even additionally over Russia’s military accumulation along the Ukrainian border last month.
Ukraine in February had enforced three-year permissions against Kozak and Medvedchuk as well as Medvedchuk’s better half, Oksana Marchenko, as part of a recurring investigation right into financing terrorism.
Additionally that month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy outlawed three pro-Russian television networks owned by Kozak and which Medvedchuk is thought to control.
Ukrainian authorities charged the domestic television networks of being a national safety risk as well as of spreading out pro-Kremlin publicity.
Ukrainian deputy Oleksiy Goncharenko had actually claimed last month that Medvedchuk and Kozak were being explored on suspicion of high treason in connection with remarks Medvedchuk had made on the channels’ banning in a meeting with the Russian government-funded RT broadcaster.