State-sponsored thugs organized by Kurchenko, prosecutor general alleges

The state-sponsored thugs employed by former President Viktor Yanukovych to terrorize pro-EU activists were organized by his close business partner, Serhiy Kurchenko, and financed by several ministries and almost all the state oblast administrations, which are the Presidential Administration’s regional organs, reported the Prosecutor General of Ukraine on March 24.

More than USD 125 mln was collected to fund the operations of the state-sponsored thugs, known as “titushky,” as well as operations to suppress peaceful protests. It was the first time in Europe that a government hired private citizens to attack its own citizens since Spanish dictator Francisco Franco in the 1940s. The funds were generated through illegal schemes, such as buying liquefied natural gas at discounted prices and reselling it to gasoline retailers at market rates. The Prosecutor General filed an arrest warrant on March 20 for Kurchenko, whose whereabouts are unknown.

Zenon Zawada: We see the pursuit and arrest of key officials in the administration of former President Viktor Yanukovyh as positive, which has also included the arrest of former Naftogaz of Ukraine Chair Yevhen Bakulin on March 22. Yet we are also concerned that the interim government, which is led by Yulia Tymoshenko’s Fatherland party, is merely pursuing a revenge campaign and is not conducting the type of lustration that’s needed, which is blind to political allegiances.

For example, the government has yet to take actions to punish Ihor Miroshnychenko, an MP from the pro-government Freedom party who physically attacked a state official on March 18 on camera when he refused to sign his resignation (admittedly, a far lesser crime that the financial machinations of the Yanukovych administration). If this trend of punishing the enemy and turning a blind eye to those in power continues, the new government won’t be able to gain legitimacy among the public, offering yet another argument for the Russian government to insert its soldiers in Ukraine.