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Timoshenko’s jail sentence has no anti-Russian connotation - Azarov

The court sentence pronounced in the case of Ukraine’s former prime minister, Yulia Timoshenko, has no anti-Russia connotation

KIEV, October 22 (Itar-Tass) —— The court sentence pronounced in the case of Ukraine’s former prime minister, Yulia Timoshenko, has no anti-Russia connotation, Prime Minister Nikolai Azarov said on Ukraine’s Inter television channel Friday evening.

“I have already said so to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. I believe that he has been able to see for himself why the court sentenced Timoshenko to seven years in jail,” he said.

“It is most important for us to come to terms with Russia on a wide range of issues, including a settlement of our relations on the issue of providing gas for Ukraine. This is most important, and our Russian partners are perfectly aware that Ukraine purchases gas under those agreements (which Timoshenko had signed) at a price that is the highest in Europe,” Azarov said.

He also added that “Ukraine does not use the illegitimacy of the gas agreements in connection with the Timoshenko’s conviction as an argument at negotiations on revising the price of Russian gas, although it insists that “the price of gas must be reasonable.”

On October 11 a court in Kiev found the former Ukrainian prime minister, Yulia Timoshenko, guilty of exceeding her powers in signing gas contracts in 2009 and sentenced her to a seven-year prison term.