Medvedchuk faces new treason and funding terrorism charges

Pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk is under
suspicion regarding new charges of treason and financing terrorism, Prosecutor
General Iryna Venediktova announced on Facebook on Oct. 8. The charges relate
to Medvedchuk’s involvement in the smuggling of coal from Russian-occupied
Donbas and its purchase by Ukrainian state-owned firms, radiosvoboda.org
reported on Oct. 8. Medvedchuk is already under suspicion for treason and the
transfer of state secrets to Russian intelligence services.

James Hydzik: The new
charges may be valid, but in the political climate that has developed after the release of the Pandora Papers,
they look politically motivated. Given the almost constant stream of scandal-after-scandal
since the Pandora Papers were released, even moves that ostensibly seem
pro-Ukrainian are looked upon with suspicion and the government’s motivations
are questioned.

Below the very real issue of President Zelensky’s
attention to his rating and the steps he’s willing to take to prop it up, his
fight against Medvedchuk contains other important aspects, such as who the
Kremlin will see as a focal point for official high-level communications; this
had been Medvedchuk’s role for decades. Perhaps there are still some in Ukraine
who see a meeting with Putin as a marker of importance or legitimacy despite
the seven years of war. Zelensky can no longer be naive enough to think that he
can turn the Kremlin’s Ukraine policy around with a face-to-face meeting, so
the reasons for it must lie elsewhere. The dance between the two leaders from
far away continues, but Medvedchuk is being publically sidelined yet again.