WASHINGTON, November 19 (RIA Novosti) – The US Senate has passed a unanimous resolution calling on Ukraine to release jailed former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko as Kiev hopes to sign an association agreement with the European Union.
The nonbinding resolution passed on Monday calls for Tymoshenko to be freed, citing a European Court of Human Rights ruling in April calling her 2011 arrest illegal and Ukraine’s bid to sign the association agreement with the EU at the two-day Eastern Partnership Summit that kicks off in Lithuania on November 28.
Prospects for that agreement look grim, however, with Ukraine having failed to take any concrete steps on releasing Tymoshenko to seek medical treatment.
Tymoshenko, a prominent opposition leader, was sentenced to seven years in prison in 2011 for abuse of power over a gas contract with Russia that was determined to be financially unfavorable for Ukraine. She insists that the charges were politically motivated.
US Senator Dick Durbin, the sponsor of the resolution, said on the Senate floor on Monday that Ukraine is a “friend and ally” of the United States and that Kiev, traditionally tied to Moscow, should look to build relationships in the West.
“Its leadership rightly sees its future with the West,” Durbin said, according to a press release.
Russia has sought to persuade Kiev to join its own Customs Union trade bloc instead of seeking closer ties with the EU.
Moscow has repeatedly flexed its trade muscle in the region in recent months, including with a ban on chocolate imports from a major Ukrainian confectioner in July, saying the goods failed sanitary tests.
Political analysts have tied the trade disputes between the two countries to Russia’s ongoing efforts to dissuade Ukraine from signing a trade deal with the EU.
