Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko was sentenced to seven years in prison in October last year by a Ukrainian court for signing a harmful gas contract with Russia, and in the meantime, several criminal proceedings were initiated against her for tax evasion and financial malfeasance.
During her stay in prison, the health condition of the convicted prime minister deteriorated greatly. According to her lawyer, Serhiy Vlasenko, she has been suffering from unbearable back pain for the past seven days. In the meantime, she decided to go on a hunger strike because she does not want to be treated at the Ukrainian hospital in Kharkiv. After she refused treatment, photos of Yulia Tymoshenko with bruises on her body appeared in public.
Germany is particularly critical of Ukraine because of the Tymoshenko case, and the government in Berlin proposed that she be treated in Germany, but Kiev refused.
The director of the Charite University Hospital in Berlin, Karl Einheuple, and his team toured the Kharkiv hospital this month, AP reported. He stated that there is little chance that her necessary and complex treatment will succeed in Ukraine, even with the participation of two or three German doctors, because the Ukrainian hospital in Kharkiv cannot provide sufficient expertise.
"I call on the Ukrainian president to be guided by humanitarian values and allow her to travel to Europe for treatment," Einheupl said.
Recently, however, the Ukrainian leadership proposed that German doctors come to Ukraine and treat her in the Kharkiv hospital. Einheupple and his colleague Norbert Haas rejected that suggestion, saying it would take weeks and possibly months for a team of experts to adequately treat her.
Tymoshenko said that she did not believe in the medical system of this hospital and that she feared that they could intentionally infect her there, German doctor Eipnhall told AP.
Einheupple pointed out that the doctors are concerned that Tymoshenko is now on hunger strike, given her otherwise weak state of health, recalling that during their visit she was "desperate" and begged to be taken for treatment.
Doctors have not commented on Yulia Tymoshenko's claims that prison guards injured her last week, punching her when they tried to take her to hospital, as Einhopple says it happened after their examination on April 17.
The EU, led by Germany, reacted strongly yesterday to reports of beatings that Yulia Tymoshenko allegedly received in a Ukrainian prison, and some German MPs warned that Tymoshenko's case could threaten Ukraine's approach to the EU.
Yulia Volodymyrivna Tymoshenko, the former Prime Minister of Ukraine before taking office in 2005, was considered a successful businesswoman. Developing a business in the gas industry, the "gas princess" as she was nicknamed, entered the circle of the richest people in Ukraine.
In her political career, she was an adviser to Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko, and during the "Narajast Revolution" she was the author of his speeches and the organizer of meetings. At that time, some media attributed to her the role of the heroine of the revolution, and in 2005, the magazine "Forbes" placed her in third place on the list of the most powerful women in the world.
Ever since she became prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko has pushed for drastic reforms. Due to his radical views, there was soon a disagreement with Viktor Yushchenko. Yulia Tymoshenko was the Prime Minister of Ukraine until 2010. After that, Mikola Azarov comes to her position.
Read more about Yulia Tymoshenko in the related texts.
