MOSCOW, April 17 (RIA Novosti) - The Russian President Vladimir Putin explained the radical anti-russian statements of former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulya Tymoshenko as being the result of a “nervous breakdown”.
“Tymoshenko, and I personally know her very well, even if she encourages shooting of Russians using nuclear weapons , I think, this is most likely because of an emotional breakdown,” Putin said during a live Q&A session on Thursday.
In March, Yulia Tymoshenko, a former Ukrainian Prime Minister and a presidential hopeful, made some controversial statements during a telephone conversation with the former Deputy Secretary of Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council, Nestor Shufrich.
During this phone call Tymoshenko said that Ukrainians must take up arms against Russians so that not even a patch of scorched earth will be left where Russia stands.
The tape of the conversation was later leaked to the Internet. Tymoshenko later acknowledged the tape's authenticity.
Tymoshenko, the leader of the Batkivschyna party, was sentenced to seven years in prison in October 2011 after negotiating an allegedly unfavorable gas deal between Russia and Ukraine.
