Politician on hunger strike alleges attack by guards
MOSCOW — Ukraine’s jailed former prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, declared a hunger strike Tuesday after what she said was an assault by prison guards that left her black and blue.
In a statement, Tymoshenko, 51, said the assault occurred Friday after she refused to leave her prison cell for a medical checkup without first consulting with her lawyer.
“’They came to my bed, threw a sheet over me and started dragging me off the bed,” she said in the statement, which was published on her website. “I received a punch to the stomach, and they twisted my arms and legs and dragged me in the sheet out into the street.”
The prosecutor general of the Kharkov region, where Tymoshenko is imprisoned, confirmed that guards had forcibly removed her from her cell but said there was no evidence that Tymoshenko had been beaten.
Although the details could not be independently confirmed, the incident could prove a rallying cry for Tymoshenko’s supporters and draw further scrutiny from Western governments, which have repeatedly called for her release.
Even from her prison cell, Tymoshenko, a fairhaired populist with a flair for political theatrics, has remained a potent force. Her supporters frequently take to the streets in protest over her treatment, and members of her Fatherland party have turned Ukraine’s parliament into a platform for promoting her cause.
Her allies have accused Ukraine’s president, Viktor Yanukovych, of orchestrating her imprisonment in an effort to clear the political playing field. Yanukovych edged Tymoshenko to win the presidential election in 2010. Just months later, she was arrested and put on trial on charges of working against Ukraine’s interests in a 2009 energy deal with Russia. Last fall, she was sentenced to seven years in prison.