Відповіді

• 2003.09.11 | peter byrne

  Re: как делить славу (кто защитит журналистов от идиотов?)

  Marchuk's Feodosiya
  11.09.2003
  By PETER BYRNE
  Post Staff Writer
  
  A Kyiv media rights group on Sept. 10 began releasing the complete text of letters received from a deceased witness to the kidnapping and murder of journalist Georgy Gongadze and implicating high-ranking officials in the three-year-old killing.
  The Institute of Mass Information released the letters a day after Deputy General Prosecutor Viktor Shokin announced that experts from the Prosecutor General's Office had confirmed the authenticity of the letters purportedly authored by Ihor Honcharov, a retired Kyiv police officer.
  Honcharov allegedly headed the Werewolves, a criminal gang made up of ex-officers that was accused of several kidnappings and murders. He died in police custody on Aug. 1.
  The posthumous letters implicate President Leonid Kuchma and two former interior ministers, Yury Kravchenko and Yury Smyrnov, in the unsolved killing.
  Honcharov wrote that members of Kyiv's organized crime bureau and criminal gang members kidnapped and killed several individuals, including Gongadze, who disappeared on Sept. 16, 2000, after leaving a colleague's apartment on Lesi Ukrainky in central Kyiv.
  "The instructions were carried out on the direct orders of [former] Interior Minister Yury Kravchenko and subsequently of Smyrnov," Honcharov wrote in a statement dated Feb. 24, 2003. "High-ranking government officials, including the president, were involved and knew about these abductions and murders."
  The letters also indicate that Honcharov identified the individuals who kidnapped Gongadze and committed other crimes to the State Security Service (SBU) and the National Security and Defense Council.
  Maria Sambur, a lawyer at IMI, told Telekritika on Aug. 8 that Honcharov's letters did not mention the president among those involved in Gongadze's disapperance and murder.
  Sambur resigned told the Post a month later that she resigned from IMI on Sept. 2 over a dispute with IMI about what to do about the letters.
  "I am leaving IMI because of the controversy," Sambur told the Post on Sept. 9.
  IMI, a Kyiv-based non-profit organization funded by philanthropist George Soros, and by the governments of the United States, France and the Netherlands, received the Honcharov letters by regular mail on Aug. 4. They were enclosed in a package bearing the words, "To be opened after my death."
  In a statement addressed to General Prosecutor Svyatoslav Pyskun and dated Feb. 24, Honcharov wrote that he provided information about Gongadze's murder to associates including independent journalist Oleh Yeltsov, an SBU agent with the surname Vasilchenko and an individual identified only by the initials Ye.K.M.
  Excerpts from some of the letters, in which most names of individuals were deleted, were first made available on IMI's site (www.imi.org.ua) on Aug. 5.
  Honcharov, who had been held in pre-trial confinement since his arrest in May 2002, died on Aug. 1 and was cremated on Aug. 3. Medical examiners have not yet determined the cause of death.
  Honcharov's attorney, Vyacheslav Smorodinov, a lawyer with the G&K firm, told the Post on Aug. 8 that his client complained that his health problems resulted from injuries sustained during police interrogations conducted in May and June 2002.
  Smorodinov said he asked prison authorities and the PGO on numerous occasions to investigate possible mistreatment of his client. He provided a document quoting Honcharov as saying he sustained his injuries when police beat him on June 11, 2002.
  The "mechanism of the trauma," according to Honcharov, was "a direct blow (or blows) to the stomach."
  Opposition groups have long accused Kuchma of involvement in Gongadze's killing, but he has repeatedly denied involvement.
  Pyskun and Rada Speaker Volodymr Lytvyn, meanwhile, failed to appear at a hearing held by the ad hoc parliamentary commission investigating Gongadze's disappearance on Sept. 9.
  Shokin, however, did appear, and he said that a handwriting analysis by PGO experts confirmed that the letter implicating Kuchma, Kravchenko and Smyrnov was written by Honcharov.
  However, Shokin said he doubted Honcharov's allegations.
  "Believing Honcharov on serious matters, that's probably not possible," he said.
  Shokin also told commission members that warrants have been issued for the arrests of three individuals involved in Gongadze's disappearance. He said there were many more suspects hiding in Ukraine and abroad. He did not indicate how these suspects had been identified.
  "We are conducting a special search for these individuals," Shokin said.
  The commission's chairman, Hryhory Omelchenko, told Ukrainska Pravda a day later that the commission would next invite Defense Minister Yevhen Marchuk to appear for questioning.
  Marchuk's initials are Ye.K.M. (Yevhen Kyryllovych Marchuk).
  "I'm not sure that Honcharov had Marchuk in mind when he wrote the initials Ye.K.M.," Omelchenko said. "We certainly intend to find out."
  Marchuk, who was appointed defense minister in July, had previously served as National Security and Defense Council Secretary since 1999. He headed the SBU in 1991-1994, and was prime minster in 1995-1996.
  Kravchenko headed the Interior Ministry from 1995 to March 2001. He was appointed governor of Kherson Oblast in December 2001, a job he held until April 2002. In December 2002, he was put in charge of the State Tax Administration.
  Smyrnov served as Kyiv's police chief before replacing Kravchenko as interior minister. Two months after his appointment, Smyrnov attracted widespread ridicule when he informed media that Gongadze was killed by two drug addicts who picked him up in central Kyiv, robbed him and then murdered him.
  Smyrnov's tenure as Kyiv police chief and as minister was tainted by allegations that members of the police force were involved in contract killings, kidnappings and corruption.
  Kuchma sacked Smyrnov on Aug. 27.