KIEV, August 18 (Itar-Tass) —— Ukraine’s first president, Leonid Kravchuk, believes that the country’s former president Viktor Yushchenko is responsible for the 2009 gas contracts with Russia as much as former Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko.
“He (Yushchenko) is one of the culprits. His place is next to Timoshenko, and not in the witness box,” said Kravchuk. He believes that if the court finds Timoshenko guilty of signing gas agreements, “Yushchenko should not testify against her, but be held responsible for these agreements.” He recalled that the Russian authorities had accused Yushchenko of lying in the Timoshenko case.
Kravchuk also said that Yushchenko had intervened in the gas talks and that he must be brought to justice as well as the former prime minister. He noted that all presidents without exception “have interfered and keep interfering in the gas energy sector, even if they do not have enough reasons to do so.” Yushchenko, in accordance with the Constitution that operated during his tenure of office, “had no such right, but he intervened.”
“Who is guilty? All presidents, perhaps, starting from yours truly – all the 17 prime ministers and four presidents – should be put on trial in order to find out who worked for the sake of Ukraine and for their own sake, and how. I’m ready for such a turn of events. I cared not about myself but about Ukraine,” said Kravchuk.
On Wednesday, Yushchenko told a court in Kiev that he saw Timoshenko’s certain political motives behind the gas agreements with Russia in 2009. He also accused the former prime minister of disrupting gas contracts with Russia in 2009 at an affordable price.