The Luhansk Regional Branch of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine views the sentence passed on 17 July against Volodymyr Struk to be politically motivated. Its real aim is to prevent a popular politician from taking part in the parliamentary elections

The defence says that the prosecution is unable to prove that Lutsenko committed any crime and wants to “prepare” new witnesses.

Friday’s court hearing into the second trial of former Interior Minister and opposition leader Yury Lutsenko was visited by a European Parliament delegation headed by former Polish President Aleksander Kwaśniewski and former EP President Patrick Cox

The High Court in Kyiv allowed the application of the prosecution and deferred the cassation hearing for another month. The former Prime Minister must exhaust all levels including cassation before applying, as planned to the European Court of Human Rights

The protocol of the last witness in the case was read out by Judge Medushevska despite strong objections from Yury Lutsenko and the defence counsel. The judge also ignored requests for defence witnesses to be called

On Tuesday the Kyivsky District Court in Kharkiv deferred until 23 July the next hearing into the new trial of former Prime Minister and opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko

In the Monaco Declaration just adopted, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly urges Ukraine to resolve issues of rule of law, human rights and democracy, in line with its OSCE Human Dimension commitments, before taking over the OSCE Chairmanship in 2013;

The latest witness in the separate trial of Yury Lutsenko, former Interior Minister, has effectively negated the grounds for criminal prosecution

The EU Mission states that the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Lutsenko v. Ukraine confirms the concerns consistently expressed by the EU about the need to apply systematically the Rule of Law and about politically motivated trials in Ukraine.

It hopes that "the Ukrainian government will seize the opportunity of this clear judgement to take action that will demonstrate their intention to move closer to EU standards on rule of law and democracy

The Court in Strasbourg has unanimously found violations of Articles 5 § 1 (right to liberty and security); 5 § 2 (right to be informed of the reasons for one’s arrest); 5 § 3 (right to be brought promptly before a judge)-trial detention; 5 § 4 (right to challenge the lawfulness of one’s detention) with respect to the initial detention of former Interior Minister Yury Lutsenko

One day before the European Court of Human Rights is to announce its judgement on Yury Lutsenko’s detention, the judge in his second agreed not to read out testimony in her absence of a witness who in January testified in court in Lutsenko’s favour

The European Court of Human Rights will be announcing its judgement following the public hearing into the case on 17 April this year

If Ukraine’s Court of Cassation does not satisfactorily resolve the issue of the imprisoned former government members, President Yanukovych should intervene politically in order to resolve the issue, according to PACE’s monitoring co-rapporteurs for Ukraine

European Parliament deputies, Ukrainian human rights workers and Ms Tymoshenko’s defence see the delay in hearing her appeal as aimed at preventing her from taking part in the elections and from applying to the European Court of Human Rights

Three more witnesses in the second trial of Yury Lutsenko, former Interior Minister in Yulia Tymoshenko’s government about surveillance in the investigation of Yushchenko’s poisoning have stated in court that there was nothing unlawful about it.

The High Specialized Court on Civil and Criminal Cases in Kyiv on Tuesday postponed until 12 July the hearing into former Prime Minister and opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko’s appeal against her seven-year sentence

The court has allowed an application from the Prosecutor and ordered a forensic medical examination to determine whether Ms Tymoshenko is able to be present at the court hearings

On the recommendation of her German doctors, former Prime Minister and opposition leader, Yulia Tymoshenko will not be attending the court hearing on charges of tax evasion on 25 June

During the latest court hearing in the second trial of Yury Lutsenko, former Interior Minister in Yulia Tymoshenko’s government, two more witnesses have testified in his favour