The RUPOR editorial office received a letter from a former character of our publications from Chernihiv, a student of the Chernihiv State Pedagogic University named after Taras Shevchenko Oleksandr Lomako. It is a letter-appeal to the minister of internal affairs Yuriy Lutsenko with the request to treat his new appointments more selectively. 

Let’s remind that during the electoral campaign of 2004 Oleksandr Lomako was persecuted by the law machinery: he was repeatedly groundlessly detained by militiamen, with no protocol about the facts; many times he was withdrawn agitation literature on opposition; he was often shaded, his mobile phone was often tapped. The apogee of pressure happened at night on October 19, when the flat Oleksandr rented in Kyiv was searched and there were “found” and “withdrawn” 170 counterfeit hryvnias, 576 grams of trotyl with a built-in detonator and almost 40 kilograms of agitation and informational literature of the public campaign PORA. Since October 19, 2004 Oleksandr Lomako stayed in an isolator of temporary custody suspected of keeping a highly explosive devise of average power and counterfeit money. On October 29 he was released due to a written undertaking not to leave a place, and on November 20, with the help of an advocate provided by the Fund of legal support of the Ukrainian Helsinki Union for human rights the city’s prosecution and the court exculpated Oleksandr Lomako.     

During that search five militiamen were present in the flat, the group was headed by Bespalchy. But in fact the search was directed by Yuriy Shafray, who took out form jacket’s pocket the counterfeit money and the explosive from the stove in the kitchen. It should be added that during the search he behaved rather impudently: forbade to use mobile phones, call advocate, and when Tetiana Pekur present during the search tried to call, he beat the phone out of her hand and gave a slap in the face.

In his appeal to the minister of internal affairs Lomako informs that on May 12, 2005 Yuriy Shafray was appointed the deputy head of the Chernihiv city militia. “This appointment raises many questions. If for such responsible posts in the law machinery people who actively participated in mass repressions of the former regime will be appointed, one won’t even dream about the “militia with human face” trusted by citizens you told about!”, – singled out Oleksandr in his appeal.

Viktoriya Onyshchenko

RUPOR