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I will not attend them. It is time for HARDtalk now. | :00:10. | :00:15. | |
This summer, Ukraine is co-hosting the European football championships | :00:15. | :00:21. | |
but don't be deceived by the sporting camaraderie. Ukraine's | :00:22. | :00:26. | |
political relationship with the EU is in crisis. The most pressing | :00:26. | :00:31. | |
dispute concerns Yulia Tymoshenko, the former prime minister in jail | :00:31. | :00:35. | |
for seven years after a trial dismissed as a political a charade | :00:35. | :00:41. | |
by many in the west. My guest today is her daughter, Yevgenia | :00:41. | :00:51. | |
:00:51. | :01:16. | ||
Tymoshenko. What does the family Welcome to HARDtalk. You have been | :01:16. | :01:20. | |
thrust into a role that you can never have wanted - campaigning on | :01:20. | :01:28. | |
behalf of your mother. What is it like we do? Actually I have started | :01:28. | :01:34. | |
as my mother's public defender in the court key ring back in August. | :01:34. | :01:41. | |
Since she was illegally arrested. I became a witness, in voluntary | :01:41. | :01:51. | |
:01:51. | :01:51. | ||
witness of the process. You were in court every day? Every day. It was | :01:51. | :01:56. | |
held with no brakes, no possibility for the defence to prepare the | :01:56. | :02:04. | |
strategy. I was able to see the ugly picture behind the so-called | :02:04. | :02:10. | |
independent judicial system. took a couple of months for the | :02:10. | :02:17. | |
court procedures to unfold. Was your mother very surprised to be | :02:17. | :02:26. | |
convicted and to be sentenced? Today, actually ten years ago today | :02:26. | :02:32. | |
I was in England and both of my parents and my grandfather were in | :02:32. | :02:37. | |
prison for political repression and I can see it as deja-vu from this | :02:37. | :02:47. | |
:02:47. | :02:48. | ||
event. What is happening now is the result of my mother's fight with | :02:48. | :02:53. | |
corruption. Her goal as a politician is to keep going, keep | :02:53. | :03:03. | |
:03:03. | :03:07. | ||
fighting for democracy in Ukraine. We can say that she thought she | :03:07. | :03:11. | |
would be persecuted as the main political opponent. She prepared | :03:11. | :03:16. | |
herself for the likelihood she was going to be in prison? | :03:16. | :03:24. | |
questioning her and visits to the prosecutor's office started in | :03:24. | :03:33. | |
early 2010. It started to become evident that she would be one of | :03:33. | :03:39. | |
the main victims of the political repression again. She has had | :03:39. | :03:45. | |
several months in prison and was moved from a cell in Kiev to a | :03:45. | :03:54. | |
prison camp, a penal camp 300 miles east of Kiev. There is speculation | :03:54. | :03:59. | |
about her health. She has seen independent doctors from other | :03:59. | :04:06. | |
countries. How is her health? in bad condition. It is getting | :04:06. | :04:14. | |
worse and has been so since her arrest. She started having symptoms | :04:14. | :04:22. | |
on her skin after a couple of weeks into the arrest and now, starting | :04:22. | :04:29. | |
from October she has been suffering back pain. She cannot walk. She has | :04:29. | :04:35. | |
not had any medical treatment so far. The doctor's report has not | :04:35. | :04:42. | |
been fully released but they point to a hernia problem. The Ukrainian | :04:42. | :04:46. | |
authorities have a look that the report and said this is a | :04:46. | :04:52. | |
validation of our treatment of her. They are not suggesting she needs | :04:52. | :04:56. | |
special surgery. Are you satisfied that she is getting the treatment | :04:56. | :05:00. | |
she needs? She's not getting any treatment actually, at the moment. | :05:01. | :05:05. | |
We don't know if she will get treatment. It has been a very hard | :05:05. | :05:13. | |
battle for us to get an independent doctor to see her. Diplomats and | :05:13. | :05:19. | |
the world to put pressure on authorities. After a few days of | :05:20. | :05:26. | |
battling they managed to see her but now when main issue their | :05:26. | :05:30. | |
preliminary diagnosis and are preparing the recommendations, the | :05:30. | :05:36. | |
doctors from the Ministry of Health in Ukraine keep manipulating and | :05:37. | :05:42. | |
also find the diagnosis. understand, of course, why it you | :05:42. | :05:46. | |
are campaigning around the world to get your mother out. You have to | :05:46. | :05:51. | |
accept that she went through due process in Ukraine. There was a | :05:51. | :05:58. | |
court preceding open to the public. She was convicted in a court of law | :05:58. | :06:02. | |
under Ukrainian law. She was found guilty of exceeding her authority | :06:02. | :06:06. | |
when she was prime minister, particularly in relation to the gas | :06:06. | :06:12. | |
deal with the Russians in 2009. And she is in prison. You call on the | :06:12. | :06:17. | |
President to release her but that would be flying in the face of due | :06:17. | :06:26. | |
process, of the constitution, would it not? There are many explanations | :06:26. | :06:36. | |
:06:36. | :06:36. | ||
as to what is going on. Their earlier in the process a report was | :06:36. | :06:42. | |
commissioned in regard to the political repression in Ukraine. | :06:42. | :06:48. | |
They say it is 100% politically motivated. After the promised | :06:48. | :06:57. | |
reforms for the judiciary system, there is a prosecutor-general, head | :06:57. | :07:07. | |
:07:07. | :07:16. | ||
of security service - who has left. Claiming by the government that the | :07:16. | :07:21. | |
judiciary system is independent is a liar and misinformation. I do not | :07:21. | :07:26. | |
believe your mother consistently called it corrupt and Russian to | :07:26. | :07:31. | |
the core when she was prime minister, a leading figure in the | :07:31. | :07:36. | |
Ukrainian political elite. When she was the Prime Minister she had very | :07:36. | :07:40. | |
high responsibility but very limited powers and instruments to | :07:40. | :07:47. | |
implement reforms. After the victory was stolen, just before the | :07:47. | :07:54. | |
Orange Revolution, she did not go after him. She didn't have used the | :07:54. | :07:59. | |
law system, the criminal court to put him to prison for falsifying | :07:59. | :08:07. | |
the elections for using corrupt measures to get to the presidency. | :08:07. | :08:13. | |
She had much more important things to do. To care for the population | :08:13. | :08:20. | |
via social and economic reforms. want to talk to you about her | :08:21. | :08:27. | |
relationship with that the former and current presidents. She now | :08:27. | :08:32. | |
faces the prospect of more charges. These charges go back to the late | :08:32. | :08:39. | |
1990s when she was the very powerful loner, with your father, | :08:39. | :08:49. | |
:08:49. | :08:49. | ||
of an energy company that made an awful lot of money. She's connected | :08:49. | :08:54. | |
with fraud due to the vast amount of money she made in that time. In | :08:54. | :08:57. | |
Ukraine there are questions about her economic activities at the | :08:57. | :09:06. | |
times. There are certain problems with the so-called criminal cases. | :09:06. | :09:11. | |
They are fundamental problems. They have been closed by the Supreme | :09:11. | :09:17. | |
Court of Ukraine six years ago when my mother was in opposition already. | :09:17. | :09:23. | |
The Criminal Cases go back to the 1990s and do not have legal basis. | :09:23. | :09:28. | |
In the time they accused her of some economic mishandling she was | :09:28. | :09:33. | |
not part of the corporation any more. She left the corporation in | :09:33. | :09:39. | |
1996 when she started politics. would not deny that she was a close | :09:39. | :09:44. | |
associate of a former premier of Ukraine who eventually fled the | :09:44. | :09:50. | |
country under a cloud of allegations and in California was | :09:50. | :09:53. | |
convicted of money laundering. She clearly benefited from her link to | :09:53. | :09:59. | |
this man who many would call a classic Ukrainian oligarch of the | :09:59. | :10:06. | |
time. He was prime minister then and she was a business woman, very | :10:06. | :10:15. | |
successful and she started the really huge corporation. Recreate | :10:15. | :10:19. | |
to the trade links between ex Soviet countries after the collapse | :10:19. | :10:23. | |
of the Soviet Union. The amount of benefit the Corporation brought was | :10:23. | :10:32. | |
immense. Primarily, your family. Had she and your father decided | :10:32. | :10:38. | |
that perhaps it is time to be about how much money your parents | :10:38. | :10:48. | |
:10:48. | :10:49. | ||
made at that time? Theories of the cynicism and about -- there is | :10:49. | :10:53. | |
cynicism about politicians. If your mother wants to prove that her | :10:53. | :10:57. | |
hands are entirely clean, wouldn't it be good to be transparent about | :10:57. | :11:02. | |
this period of her life? It is completely transparent. The amount | :11:02. | :11:09. | |
of time and effort, money that has been spent to investigate her | :11:09. | :11:15. | |
corrupt activities and you see the results - the Supreme Court closed | :11:15. | :11:24. | |
the Criminal Cases. No corruption. This time now all of the charges | :11:24. | :11:28. | |
have no legal basis at all because they have been resurrected from | :11:28. | :11:33. | |
something that has been proven and accepted as having no criminal | :11:33. | :11:37. | |
substance at all. It seems your mother feels she is being | :11:38. | :11:41. | |
personally persecuted in a very direct way by the President. Is | :11:41. | :11:48. | |
that true? If you look at the way the courts went, the charges | :11:48. | :11:55. | |
against her, they have been disproved an seen as absurd charges | :11:55. | :12:00. | |
by the democratic world. Accepted as such. Let me stop you there. You | :12:00. | :12:06. | |
have said several times they are absurd. Why is it that there hasn't | :12:06. | :12:11. | |
been a greater public reaction inside Ukraine? Hundreds of people, | :12:11. | :12:17. | |
your mother's supporters. A few people tried to demonstrate outside | :12:17. | :12:21. | |
the prison. We remember the vast hundreds of thousands of people | :12:21. | :12:27. | |
from the Orange revolution which your mother co-led. Why haven't | :12:27. | :12:32. | |
those crowds been out there for your mother? There is a simple | :12:32. | :12:40. | |
answer for this. My mother was free and if that was the case the | :12:40. | :12:50. | |
:12:50. | :12:53. | ||
protests would be bigger. People... If people cared enough about your | :12:53. | :13:03. | |
:13:03. | :13:03. | ||
mother's plight wouldn't they be There are show trials not just for | :13:03. | :13:08. | |
my mother but many politicians and ex-colleagues. They have increased | :13:08. | :13:13. | |
the number of police and militia forces by hundreds. They have | :13:13. | :13:17. | |
increased their pay and their rank. You can see that even after a small | :13:17. | :13:24. | |
protest happens, twice as many police and militia are outside | :13:24. | :13:27. | |
trying to force people out on the street -- of the street. | :13:27. | :13:33. | |
It seems to me that there may be one reason why there is some apathy | :13:33. | :13:39. | |
in regard to your mother's current situation, is that it is deep | :13:39. | :13:43. | |
disappointment inside the Ukraine at what happened to the Orange | :13:44. | :13:48. | |
revolution. What happened to the relationship between your mother | :13:48. | :13:52. | |
and the former President? The CEO leaders of the revolution mood then | :13:53. | :13:58. | |
had the opportunity to govern together. It failed miserably and | :13:58. | :14:01. | |
they found out and engaged in a vendetta and a fight between the | :14:01. | :14:06. | |
two of them and we saw in the end, the former President testified in | :14:06. | :14:11. | |
accord effectively against your mother, saying that the deal your | :14:11. | :14:17. | |
mother had struck with the Russians was unjustifiably high a price and | :14:17. | :14:20. | |
only political motives could have played a role. National interests | :14:20. | :14:25. | |
were traded for political considerations - an incredibly | :14:25. | :14:33. | |
damning indictment of your mother. I can say only a few things. There | :14:33. | :14:38. | |
have been national polls going at the moment in the Ukraine which say | :14:38. | :14:43. | |
that the President's popularity is less than 1% but my mother's | :14:43. | :14:53. | |
:14:53. | :14:54. | ||
popularity is 3% and growing. His popularity is plummeting. Talking | :14:54. | :14:58. | |
about their relationship, I am not a politician and I was not bear | :14:58. | :15:03. | |
during all of this protest at the time but I saw that my mother did | :15:03. | :15:09. | |
everything she could. She did everything she could with the | :15:09. | :15:15. | |
instruments she had to agree to negotiate this difficult contract. | :15:15. | :15:20. | |
She attempted to make agreements with the International Monetary | :15:20. | :15:26. | |
Fund to get through very, very hard times economically and with social | :15:27. | :15:31. | |
reforms to support people who are up warm such as single mothers, | :15:31. | :15:39. | |
pensioners and disabled people. But what people remember are a | :15:39. | :15:45. | |
fight between your mother. -- what people remember are the fight | :15:45. | :15:49. | |
between a mother and the President. Some up for me what she thinks of | :15:49. | :15:53. | |
him now? During the trial, I was present and | :15:53. | :15:58. | |
he gave a humiliating and horrible witness statement during the court | :15:59. | :16:06. | |
case. By trying to give value as a whole struggle of the Orange | :16:06. | :16:15. | |
revolution. My mother kept silent, although she could ask him and many | :16:15. | :16:21. | |
questions to counter his arguments but she kept silent because she did | :16:22. | :16:26. | |
not want to completely ruin this idea that the people fought for and | :16:26. | :16:30. | |
that she fought for so much during this time and I remember, for | :16:30. | :16:37. | |
example, when she pushed for a very transparent privatisation in the | :16:37. | :16:41. | |
Ukraine, the President was just signing a decree with one signature | :16:41. | :16:46. | |
to cancel all of these good things they could of been done. | :16:46. | :16:50. | |
Your characterisation of what the President said in court is not | :16:50. | :16:55. | |
shared by him and his supporters. But it is shared by millions of | :16:55. | :16:59. | |
people in Ukraine. He that is something that may or | :16:59. | :17:03. | |
may not be subject to future legal action in the Ukraine but certainly | :17:03. | :17:09. | |
we need to be clear that it is very much your opinion. But let us | :17:09. | :17:12. | |
change the focus here. It seems to me that a lot of the campaigning | :17:13. | :17:17. | |
and what you are doing right now is not so much inside the Ukraine and | :17:17. | :17:21. | |
talking to people and the Ukraine in getting them out in support of | :17:21. | :17:25. | |
your mother but it is aimed at western powers. You spend a lot of | :17:25. | :17:28. | |
time and the United States and European capitals trying to rally | :17:28. | :17:32. | |
support in the West. There is it that because it is easier for you | :17:32. | :17:37. | |
to deal with the West? When you sit in a courtroom and you | :17:37. | :17:42. | |
hear the judges rejecting everything that the Defence says | :17:42. | :17:49. | |
that is true, finding and the cases some stupid mistakes... Light, | :17:49. | :17:54. | |
there were materials collected on 31st April or in a future date | :17:55. | :18:01. | |
which does not exist. There are so many breaches of human rights you | :18:01. | :18:05. | |
see there and so many breaches of the law and constitution... | :18:05. | :18:09. | |
Your anger and your passion to write what you perceive to be a | :18:09. | :18:13. | |
wrong seems to involve you spending an awful lot of time outside your | :18:13. | :18:18. | |
country in the West. Years because you visit -- because | :18:18. | :18:25. | |
when I tried to visit my mother and I have no right to and my mother is | :18:25. | :18:31. | |
not getting any medical treatment, she is being tortured. There is | :18:31. | :18:36. | |
nobody in the Ukraine that can help me and solve this problem. The | :18:36. | :18:40. | |
President, the top person in the Ukraine, chose to lead this kind of | :18:40. | :18:44. | |
oppression that has been condemned by the whole world for many times. | :18:44. | :18:49. | |
Nothing can the done. So you want the United States and | :18:49. | :18:56. | |
the European Union to... What? Sent a message via sanctions or what? We | :18:56. | :18:59. | |
have already seen the European Union freeze the trade and | :19:00. | :19:03. | |
political agreement that they were going to sign with the Ukraine but | :19:03. | :19:05. | |
how much further do you want them to go? | :19:05. | :19:11. | |
I am here and I am talking about what is happening in the Ukraine, | :19:11. | :19:15. | |
but democratic crisis that is going on and talking on bar of a million | :19:15. | :19:22. | |
people who feel the same as I feel now and what is happening to my | :19:22. | :19:25. | |
mother is the pinnacle of this whole crisis and this horrible | :19:25. | :19:31. | |
breach of every human rights. There is no rule of law in the Ukraine. | :19:31. | :19:36. | |
We respect that all of the studies of the Ukraine done by independent | :19:36. | :19:42. | |
experts, they do not suggest that | :19:42. | :19:45. | |
bitter when the your mother was Prime Minister over the last six or | :19:45. | :19:50. | |
seven years. There has been constant advice t the Ukraine that | :19:50. | :19:58. | |
it needs to improve its political freedoms, its media freedoms... | :19:58. | :20:02. | |
Nevertheless, according to Freedom House, we were a free country but | :20:02. | :20:09. | |
now we are only partially free. During my mother's incumbency, we | :20:09. | :20:13. | |
became part of the World Trade Organisation and we started | :20:13. | :20:16. | |
negotiations and to a free-trade agreement with the European Union | :20:16. | :20:19. | |
but that has now been undermined completely by the government. | :20:19. | :20:23. | |
It is interesting thatsting thater from prison sent a messent a mesg | :20:23. | :20:27. | |
that she did not want that political and free trade agreement | :20:27. | :20:31. | |
with the European Union to be blocked because of her situation. | :20:31. | :20:35. | |
She pleaded for both sides to go ahead and sign the agreement, Quote | :20:35. | :20:39. | |
unquote, for the good of the country. | :20:39. | :20:44. | |
She believed that strongly and now that in spite of the pain, in spite | :20:44. | :20:48. | |
that she has to lie down and be always in bed and in pain and under | :20:48. | :20:54. | |
write letters to her family and | :20:54. | :20:58. | |
articles to the public about what is going on, she is opposing what | :20:58. | :21:02. | |
is going on inside the Ukraine but she does not want the Ukraine to | :21:02. | :21:06. | |
see the sanctions applied against the whole of the nation and the | :21:06. | :21:11. | |
whole of the people. At least half of the voting populatig populatior | :21:11. | :21:17. | |
her so why should they suffer for the actions of a government that is | :21:17. | :21:22. | |
completely going in the wrong direction from the future. | :21:22. | :21:30. | |
I am a little bit puzzled. Your message to the leaders in obdurate | :21:30. | :21:35. | |
-- Europe is that you want them to block this important trade | :21:35. | :21:38. | |
agreement or do you want it to be signed? | :21:38. | :21:47. | |
Are of course, it is not for asked to decide... Beat the -- we do not | :21:47. | :21:55. | |
want any sanctions for this important agreement, this chance | :21:55. | :22:01. | |
for the Ukraine. That has already - - already been done by the | :22:01. | :22:05. | |
government who have undermined this. All I am asking... All we are | :22:05. | :22:15. | |
:22:15. | :22:19. | ||
asking and the mentality of the people in power now is abusive and | :22:19. | :22:28. | |
they are using... Corruption levels had been revealed to be critical. | :22:28. | :22:33. | |
Before we finish, I want to know - it is a critical year. The Ukraine | :22:33. | :22:37. | |
is on display to the world and there are Parliamentary elections | :22:37. | :22:41. | |
later in the year. You have been so outspoken in recent months. Would | :22:41. | :22:44. | |
you continue to campaign through the election period and that you | :22:44. | :22:50. | |
yourself take up the political so long? | :22:50. | :22:55. | |
I never want to be a politician and I am not planning to run any | :22:55. | :23:00. | |
political campaign... It seems as if you have to because | :23:00. | :23:03. | |
you are becoming political of necessity. | :23:03. | :23:07. | |
It is mostly provocation done by the regime's media, saying that I | :23:07. | :23:14. | |
am running for political office. By political goal but that is | :23:14. | :23:17. | |
completely untrue and it is done to the value my efforts to do anything | :23:17. | :23:21. | |
helpful for my mother and for political prisoners in beat Ukraine. | :23:21. | :23:25. | |
Solely my mission is to help spread the message -- message and help | :23:25. | :23:28. | |
people. Do you believe you will free your | :23:28. | :23:31. | |
mother this year? I hope so. | :23:31. | :23:36. |