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Timoshenko was involved in murder of legislator in 1996 – first deputy prosecutor

The killers received money for Shcherban’s murder from the accounts of Pavel Lazarenko and Yulia Timoshenko

KIEV, November 26 (Itar-Tass) —— Ukraine’s former prime minister, Yulia Timoshenko, was involved in the murder of a member of parliament, Yevgeny Shcherban, in 1996, First Deputy Prosecutor-General Renat Kuzmin said on Ukraine’s Inter television channel late Friday evening.

“The killers received money for Shcherban’s murder from the accounts of Pavel Lazarenko and Yulia Timoshenko. This has been proven with documents, there are practically no doubts about that,” Kuzmin said. He recalled that at that time Timoshenko was practically the monopolist on the country’s energy market. Lazarenko, the then head of government, lobbied her business interests.

“Shcherban was eliminated as a competitor. He, his wife and the accompanying persons were murdered in cold blood at the airport of Donetsk,” Kuzmin said.

He declared that the Ukrainian Prosecutor-General’s Office had asked US counterparts for assistance.

“We have many questions we would like to put to Lazarenko, and also to witnesses in the case who are resident in the United States,” Kuzmin said.

Earlier, he claimed that the Timoshenko affair was a “years-long story involving various crimes, including, possibility, contract killings.”

In the United States Lazarenko was convicted of money laundering.

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