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Saakashvili obtained $500,000 from Yanukovich to hold rallies — Kiev's top prosecutor

On Tuesday, Ukraine’s Security Service and the Prosecutor-General’s Office detained Saakashvili on charges of "complicity with a criminal group"

© AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka

KIEV, December 5. /TASS/. Former Georgian leader and ex-Odessa Regional Governor Mikhail Saakashvili used the money of ex-Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovich to hold rallies in Ukraine to seize power, Ukrainian Prosecutor-General Yuri Lutsenko said on Tuesday.

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Kremlin on Saakashvili: Moscow not accustomed to replying to people who perch on rooftops

According to Lutsenko, Saakashvili’s proxy person Severion Dangadze received the money from fugitive oligarch Sergey Kurchenko, an accomplice of Yanukovich. "Using their money, Mikhail Saakashvili and his allies funded the protests organized by them and the goal was to take power."

Kurchenko has decided to sponsor Saakashvili’s opposition Movement of New Forces to return the assets that he lost after leaving Ukraine, Lutsenko explained.

He claimed that Ukraine’s special services have proof that Dangadze, who coordinates the Movement of New Forces, received money "from the Russian side."

On Tuesday, Ukraine’s Security Service and the Prosecutor-General’s Office detained Saakashvili on charges of "complicity with a criminal group."

However, some 200 his supporters blocked a car with the detained politician.

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Ukraine crisis Mikhail Saakashvili

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