The legal team of former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko will next week file an appeal against her seven-year jail sentence, one of her lawyers said on Wednesday. “We are going to hand in the appeal next week,” lawyer Yuriy Sukhov said, adding that the defence needed to go through the entire appeals process in Ukraine if it was to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights. He said that the appeal would be filed with the Kiev appeals court and later with the court of cassation. “But, unfortunately, we do not have great hope that the verdict will be annulled,” he said, quoted by Tymoshenko’s official website.
The opposition leader has claimed the decision to jail her for exceeding her powers in a gas deal with Russia in 2009 was ordered by President Viktor Yanukovych and the conviction sparked international outrage. Sukhov appeared more optimistic over the prospect of cancelling the article of the penal code under which Tymoshenko was condemned, an idea that has been mooted by some lawmakers and could be discussed in parliament next week. “If article 365 is decriminalised then the verdict will be cancelled completely,” he said, adding this would included the financial losses of almost $200 million that Tymoshenko has been ordered to pay back under the ruling.