Medvedchuk was just lately captured by Ukrainian forces having fled home arrest quickly after the struggle started.
Vinnytsia, Ukraine – Final Might, 67-year-old Viktor Medvedchuk, a Ukrainian politician near Russian President Vladimir Putin, was charged with treason in Kyiv, accused of promoting army secrets and techniques to Russia and looting pure sources in annexed Crimea.
He was positioned underneath home arrest and Putin instantly accused Kyiv of “purging the political subject of all of the forces that stand for a peaceable decision” of the Russia-Ukraine disaster.
“So, everybody who works with Russia in Ukraine might be held accountable?” stated Putin, who's godfather to Medvedchuk’s daughter.
On February 28 this 12 months, 4 days after Russia invaded Ukraine, Medvedchuk fled his home arrest.
His unimpeded escape was seen as an indication of weak point of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s authorities amid the chaos and uncertainty of the struggle’s first days.
However Ukrainian forces thwarted Putin’s blitzkrieg – and intelligence service stored searching for Medvedchuk, whose pro-Russia political occasion, Eurosceptic Opposition Platform – For Life, suspended operations a month after his escape.
On Tuesday, Zelenskyy introduced in a Twitter put up that Medvedchuk had been apprehended after a “lightning-speed operation” by Ukraine’s Safety Service.
The put up included a photograph of the handcuffed Medvedchuk, wanting pallid and saggy in a badly becoming army uniform; prior to now, he was usually seen in bespoke fits and with a smile on his face.
Medvedchuk’s transformation from Putin’s right-hand man right into a fugitive turned an ideal counterpoint of Ukraine’s political and ideological metamorphosis.
Professional-Moscow and pro-Western political forces had polarised the ex-Soviet nation of 43 million, the place a 3rd of the inhabitants nonetheless speaks Russian at house. The shortage of unity within the halls of energy hobbled reforms, bred corruption, and made Medvedchuk probably the most highly effective conduit of Moscow’s affect.
From lawyer to Putin’s man in Ukraine
A Soviet-era lawyer criticised for poor defence of Ukrainian dissidents within the Eighties, Medvedchuk entered politics a decade later after becoming a member of after which heading a pro-Moscow socialist occasion.
Within the early 2000s, he headed the administration of Leonid Kuchma, a pro-Russia president – and developed the picture of a taciturn “gray cardinal”.
He met Putin for the primary time in 2003 and, a 12 months later, the Russian president baptised his youngest daughter Darya in a St Petersburg cathedral.
Medvedchuk then managed the election marketing campaign of Victor Yanukovych, a fiercely pro-Moscow presidential candidate.
Yanukovych’s victory within the 2004 vote sparked the Orange Revolution, Ukraine’s first pro-Western revolt, whose organisers accused Medvedchuk of rigging the vote.
It was additionally dubbed the “battle of three Victors,” as a result of Yanukovych’s important rival was Viktor Yushchenko, whose face was disfigured after what he stated was a Kremlin-orchestrated poisoning with dioxin.
The anti-Russian Viktor’s subsequent victory in a repeat runoff election marked Medvedchuk’s non permanent downfall from the political Olympus. He did not be re-elected as a lawmaker, and his political occasion polled dismally.
However he began placing collectively a media empire that may finally embrace three tv networks and a string of publications.
Medvedchuk’s former protege Yanukovych received the 2010 presidential vote, however Medvedchuk was largely sidelined.
He remained Putin’s important man and regained affect after Yanukovych was overthrown in 2014 by Ukraine’s second pro-Western revolt, generally known as the Revolution of Dignity.
Medvedchuk bankrolled Opposition Platform – For Life, the most important pro-Russian occasion, which fielded a candidate within the 2018 presidential vote.
He visited the Kremlin to advertise the candidate, Yuri Boyko, triggering a political storm in Ukraine. However Boyko got here fourth, and Zelenskyy received with a staggering 73 p.c.
In a parliamentary election a 12 months later, Medvedchuk’s occasion received 44 seats within the 450-seat Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s decrease home of parliament, changing into the most important faction against Zelenskyy’s Public Servant occasion.
Medvedchuk’s occasion resisted Ukraine’s “de-communisation” efforts to take away Soviet-era monuments and symbols, and opposed the “language legislation” that curbed using Russian in mass media and public life.
Medvedchuk boosted the occasion’s media presence via his tv networks, which avoided instantly praising the Kremlin.
However their anchors usually described Kyiv’s battle with Russia-backed separatists as a “civil struggle”, stated that Crimea’s inhabitants supported the 2014 annexation, and known as for the restoration of commerce with Moscow.
The occasion additionally paid for tales in different shops, a media monitor claimed in 2018. Medvedchuk “commissioned” a couple of third of on-line media studies that contained sturdy indicators of bias, the Institute of Mass Info alleged.
He and his closest allies have been sanctioned in 2021 by Zelenskyy, who additionally froze their belongings and closed down his TV networks.
If tried and convicted, Medvedchuk faces as much as 15 years in jail. Nonetheless, Zelenskyy stated he would favor to swap him for Ukrainian prisoners of struggle.
“I suggest to the Russian Federation to change this man of yours for our boys and our women who are actually in Russian captivity,” Zelenskyy stated in a video handle, posted on Telegram.
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