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Yanukovych Ready to Cooperate With Ukraine’s Investigators on Euromaidan Killings, Lawyer Says

KIEV (Sputnik) - Former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych is ready to cooperate with Ukrainian investigators regarding the killings during the Euromaidan protests in 2014, lawyer Vitaly Serdyuk said on Thursday.
Sputnik

“Today we will submit to the State Bureau of Investigation a statement signed by Viktor Yanukovych, which is addressed to all judicial and law enforcement bodies of Ukraine, that he [Yanukovych] will fully cooperate with them to find out the truth about the events of 2014, in particular, about executions on the Maidan and surrender of Crimea,” Serdyuk wrote on his Facebook page.

The day before, Serdyuk said that Ukraine's former President Petro Poroshenko and ex-Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuri Lutsenko are attempting to conceal their and their “Western handlers'” involvement in the shooting of police officers and civilians that transpired during the 2014 Euromaidan coup.

The Euromaidan protests kicked off late in 2013 and lasted for several months, with protesters demanding that the government of then-President of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovich sign an association agreement with the European Union.

On 20 February 2014, during the Euromaidan mass protests, unidentified gunmen opened fire on protesters and police officers in central Kiev, killing 53 people.

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On January 24, 2019, Kiev's Obolonsky district court found Yanukovych guilty in the treason case and sentenced him in absentia to 13 years of imprisonment. The ex-president denies his guilt, qualifying the case as politically motivated.

Crimea reunified with Russia in 2014 following a successful referendum on the matter on the peninsula. While Western countries and Kiev have not recognized Crimea's new status, Moscow has insisted that the referendum was carried out in line with international law.

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