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Prosecutors to question lawyer representing ex-president of Ukraine over Maidan events

Earlier, Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office summoned Yanukovich for questioning on the charges of treason

Victor Yanukovich (L) with his attorney, Vitaly Serdyuk (R) Valery Matytsin/TASS

Victor Yanukovich (L) with his attorney, Vitaly Serdyuk (R)

© Valery Matytsin/TASS

KIEV, December 5. /TASS/. Lawyer Vitaly Serdyuk will represent the interests of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich who has been summoned for questioning by military prosecutors of Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office in Kiev on Monday.

"I will represent the interests of Viktor Yanukovich and will inform about a reasonable excuse of my client for the failure to appear before the investigator," lawyer Serdyuk said.

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Earlier, Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office summoned Yanukovich for questioning on a high treason charge on December 5 and December 9.

Last Monday, Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Yuri Lutsenko charged Yanukovich with "high treason, colluding with the Russian authorities in order to alter Ukraine’s borders, violating Ukraine’s Constitution and waging an aggressive war." The charges against Yanukovich were brought during an interval in the court hearing on the 2014 Maidan events case, during which Yanukovich had been responding to the court’s questions via videoconference while in Russia’s city of Rostov-on-Don.

Lutsenko pointed out that he was serving the charges on Yanukovich viva voce but "a document will be handed over to Yanukovich’s attorney." The written charges will be soon forwarded to all the known Yanukovich’s addresses, including the one in Russia, he said.

A number of Ukrainian lawyers have called prosecutor general’s statement made in Kiev’s Svyatoshinsky District Court null and void. "According to the relevant regulations, any written charges should be handed over directly to the person involved," attorney Andrei Smirnov said. At the same time, he stressed that Yanukovich had received no such notifications.

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Ukraine crisis Viktor Yanukovych

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