A year after the tragic riots and fire in Odesa on May 2, 2014, a top police official is facing charges and civic investigators have upheld their right to information which is of clear public importance. A draft bill has also been tabled which could waive charges for people accused only of participation in riots, increasing the chances of finding the organizers and initiators

The trial in Russian-occupied Crimea of Oleksandr Kostenko is one of unprecedented cynicism and of critical importance, sending a message to any Crimean, or Ukrainian national who appears in Crimea that they can face trumped-up charges over which courts in Crimea can have no jurisdiction, yet still find themselves behind bars.

The latest court hearing in the trial of young Maidan activist Oleksandr Kostenko was full of features as absurd as the charges against him, with the court accepting the ‘testimony’ of an anonymous witness for the prosecution and the inclusion in the file material of a totally unsubstantiated claim made by a blogger.

Akhtem Chiygoz, Deputy Head of the Mejlis or Crimean Tatar representative assembly has gone on hunger strike in protest at being placed in a solitary confinement punishment cell. There are fears that the occupation regime may be planning a show trial of a leader of the Crimean Tatar national movement on the eve of the anniversary of the Deportation.

While visiting Odesa on April 10, President Petro Poroshenko called ensuring an objective investigation of the events in Odesa on May 2, 2014 “a test of justice for Ukraine’s law enforcement bodies”. It is a test that unfortunately they have thus far failed. This is especially galling given the need to counter Russia’s intensive propaganda campaign which presents the disturbances and fire as a ‘massacre’.

Four years after Ukraine was rocked by video images of Party of the Regions deputy Roman Landik beating up a young woman in a restaurant, a Luhansk court has decided that Landik was ‘defending himself’ and totally acquitted him.

The trial is beginning in Russian-occupied Crimea of a Ukrainian citizen accused of slightly injuring another Ukrainian citizen during the EuroMaidan protests in Ukraine’s capital city before Russia annexed Crimea. The ‘investigators’ even used Olexandr Kostenko’s Ukrainian citizenship as the pretext for holding him in custody.

The trial has begun in Russia of Khaiser Dzhemiliev after Moscow flouted an order from the European Court of Human Rights to release Khaiser from custody. The charges are much more serious now demonstrating the real motive, being to put pressure on veteran Crimean Tatar leader and Ukrainian MP Mustafa Dzhemiliev.

For the second evening in a row, Crimean police have carried out searches of the homes, first of imprisoned Maidan activist Oleksandr Kostenko’s common-law wife, then of her brother while his wife and small child were alone

The preliminary hearing was held on April 3 in the trial of Alexander Kostenko, the EuroMaidan activist facing surreal charges in Russian-occupied Crimea. Other trials, no less grotesque, are likely to follow

There is, however, no sign of any of the police; prosecutors or judges facing any kind of penalty or dismissal for their part in a case which human rights lawyer Oleh Levytsky once called the most shameful since Ukraine gained independence. Quite the contrary – some of the people have even been promoted.

Crimea’s puppet ‘prosecutor’ Natalya Poklonskay has announced that the ‘case’ against EuroMaidan activist Alexander Kostenko over alleged actions in Kyiv before Russia annexed Crimea has been passed to the court. Poklonskaya herself will be representing the prosecution in a trial which even by occupation regime standards reflects a mafia-like attitude to the law.

7-year sentence for 19-year-old ringleader of a group of supposed ‘paedophile’ persecutors who inflicted fatal injuries on one of their victims. The vigilante group was analogous to the notorious “Okkupai-pedofilyai” gangs first organized by Russian neo-Nazi former skinhead Maxim Martsinkevich.

The new law just passed into force on judicial reform has been called a significant improvement on the 2010 law, but it still retains the options for political pressure on the courts and judges which enabled ex-President Viktor Yanukovych to usurp power

Alexander Kostenko was arrested and remanded in custody in early February on charges relating not only to events that took place before Russian soldiers and tanks imposed Russian legislation on Crimea, but not even in Crimea

Parliament has removed immunity from three Pechersky District Court judges, all well-known for their role in at least one high-profile case during the presidency of Viktor Yanukovych. Serhiy Vovk and OksanaTsarevych were both involved in the 4-year- politically motivated sentence passed on former Interior Minister Yury Lutsenko

A Krasnodar court has allowed an application from Khaiser Dzhemiliev’s lawyers and appointed trial by jury, with the preliminary hearing scheduled for March 3. While it was difficult to expect justice from an ordinary Russian court, Khaiser is held illegally in Russian detention, and should not be tried there at all

Whatever the reasons for delays and flaws in investigating and prosecuting crimes related to the disturbances, fire and deaths on May 2, 2014 in Odessa, procrastination serves only the interests of Russian propaganda’s ‘massacre’ claims

Alexander Kostenko has been remanded in custody for two months by a Crimean court on charges linked with EuroMaidan protests in Kyiv last February before Russia’s invasion of Crimea. His is the first such arrest, but judging by the Russian-installed ‘prosecutor’s’ website, unlikely to be the last

Russia is continuing to flout the European Court of Human Rights by not releasing the son of veteran Crimean Tatar leader and Ukrainian MP Mustafa Dzhemiliev