KIEV, July 09. /ITAR-TASS/. Arseniy Yatsenyuk, Ukraine’s parliament-appointed Prime Minister, has urged to carry out a check of all the political parties engaging in activities that may threaten the country’s territorial integrity and to immediately strip members of these organizations of parliamentary immunity.

“I appeal to the Ministry of Justice with a request to conduct checks of the political parties and non-governmental organizations with their activity having signs of a crime — the encroachment on the territorial integrity and independence of Ukraine,” he said at a meeting of the Cabinet on Wednesday. “I have a separate request to the parliament to immediately consider inquiries on the cancellation of parliamentary immunity.”

He said, “Yesterday’s suit filed by the Ministry of Justice against the Communist Party is a suit not against a political party, but against those who commit crimes against the Ukrainian state.”

On Tuesday, Ukrainian Justice Minister Pavel Petrenko said the ministry had filed a lawsuit demanding to ban the activity of the Communist Party. According to him, there is the evidence, in particular, of violation [by the party] “of a number of provisions of the law on political parties in Ukraine regarding anti-constitutional activity, support of terrorists and separatists, military aggression,” as well as “staging  anti-Ukrainian meetings and involvement in the supply of weapons to terrorists”.

Communist leader Pyotr Simonenko on Wednesday called the attempts of the Ukrainian authorities to ban the activity of the Communist Party of Ukraine “an element of a crackdown on dissent.” “What kind of anti-constitutional activity is meant? Our party calls exclusively for constitutional, political methods of struggle,” Simonenko said. He added, the Communist Party of Ukraine has never talked of supporting separatism. “We stand for a united Ukraine and condemn any manifestations of separatism,” Simonenko said.