The court allowed the arrest of Yanukovych for the agreement on the Russian fleet in Crimea

Viktor Yanukovych

The Pechersk District Court of Kyiv allowed the arrest of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych for signing the Kharkiv Accords in 2010, the Prosecutor General's office reports on Telegram.

The Kharkiv agreements regulate the issues of the presence of the Russian Black Sea Fleet on the territory of Ukraine. Yanukovych signed them in April 2010. According to the agreements, Kyiv received a discount on Russian gas in exchange for extending the stay of the Russian fleet in Crimea after 2017 for 25 years.

Yanukovych, who left for Russia in 2014, was chosen in absentia as a measure of restraint in the form of detention in criminal proceedings under Part 1 of Art. 111 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (treason). The maximum penalty under this article is imprisonment for up to fifteen years, with or without confiscation of property.

Ukrainian investigators believe that the ex-president, together with the former prime minister (at that time he was Mykola Azarov. -) damaged the sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability, defense capability, state and economic security of the country, providing Russia with assistance in "carrying out subversive activities » against Ukraine.

After Yanukovych signed an agreement with Dmitry Medvedev, who then served as Russia's prime minister, in Kharkov, "prerequisites were artificially created for increasing the number of Russian troops on the territory of Ukraine," the Prosecutor General's Office claims. 

The deployment of the Black Sea Fleet was agreed until 2042 in exchange for a 30% reduction in the price of Russian gas, but no more than $100 per thousand cubic meters. The Ukrainian investigation believes that before signing the documents, Russia artificially raised the price of gas.

RBC turned to Viktor Yanukovych's lawyer Alexander Goroshinsky for a comment.

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In Ukraine, searches were carried out in the case of an agreement with Russia on a fleet in Crimea Politics

The State Bureau of Investigation of Ukraine (SBI) charged Yanukovych with treason in January 2021. In March, Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Oleksiy Danilov instructed the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) to check the circumstances of the ratification of the Kharkiv agreements. He stated that the decision of more than 200 deputies of the Verkhovna Rada, who voted for the document, opened the way to the "occupation of Crimea."

Later, the committees of the Verkhovna Rada, the main scientific and expert department of the parliamentary apparatus, the National Security and Defense Council, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Cabinet of Ministers and the State Bureau of Investigation of Ukraine were searched. As a result, the SBU officers found documents that indicate that the then leadership of the state "before signing and adopting these documents was aware of their consequences." The department said that the agreements led to an increase in the number of personnel of Russian military formations and special services, which "further participated in the annexation of Crimea and causing damage to economic interests."