Kyiv court orders arrest of Yanukovych and Azarov

A Kyiv district court ordered on Jan. 20 the arrest of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and former Prime Minister Mykola Azarov, in response to a request submitted by the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, as reported by its website. The measure enables prosecutors to request their extradition from the Russian Federation, the website  reported.

Zenon Zawada: Without knowing the legal nuances involving INTERPOL, it looks awfully strange for the international organization to have taken ten months to issue wanted person alerts for Yanukovych and Azarov, while it took only two days to do the same on Jan. 20 for Mykola Huta, the Mriya Agroholding executive who fled.

Moreover, Interpol declined to issue such an alert for Renat Kuzmin, the first deputy procurator general, allegedly citing political motivations for the request by Ukrainian prosecutors, as reported by a spokesman yesterday. The same reason was allegedly cited by INTERPOL for delaying alerts for Yanukovych and Azarov, though the fault could have been with the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.

Such a pattern of events leads us to believe the current government could have had undisclosed agreements with the Yanukovych entourage to nor pursue their criminal prosecution, or at least delay such attempts by as long as possible. This should concern investors because the public doesn’t trust the current government, for the most part, and could turn against it as economic conditions worsen and the war continues without a recognizable strategy or end in sight.