2009 ORDINARY SESSION

________________________

(First part)

REPORT

Fourth Sitting

Tuesday 27 January 2009 at 3 p.m.

Mr HERKEL (Estonia). – The story about Gongadze’s murder is very old. The Assembly was one of the first to react to the disappearance Georgy Gongadze in 2000 and scrupulously followed the course of the investigation by Ukrainian authorities, which unfortunately has not finished until now. The Assembly has also continuously required from the Ukrainian authorities that there should be a proper investigation and that those who carried out the murder should be brought to justice, as should the organisers and instigators of the crime.

President Yushchenko addressed the Assembly four years ago, in 2005, when he promised to ensure a full investigation regardless of the position of the suspects. Four years later, that promise has only partly been fulfilled.

After the Orange Revolution, there have been failures in the investigation, such as the alleged suicide of the former Minister of the Interior, Mr Kravchenko, and the failure to apprehend the principal suspect, General Pukach. I read the report carefully. In some ways, this story is very complicated; Mr Haibach expressed that well. The story is also a very clumsy attempt to avoid a proper investigation.

The draft resolution presented by the rapporteur contains a number of specific recommendations about how to step up the ongoing investigation, how to work with the so-called “Melnychenko recordings” and so on. I hope that we will all urge the Ukrainian authorities to implement those recommendations.

Such case studies are very important in this pan-European forum. The title of this debate refers to the case as “emblematic”. That is the case with regard to the Kuchma regime in Ukraine. Previous speakers have said that in other member states there are more complicated cases involving the orchestration of investigations and no proper attempt to complete them properly. Anna Politkovskaya has been mentioned many times and her case is very well known. I also mentioned the Markov case and there are many other examples, especially in the Russian Federation. Journalists working for Novayagazeta have been systematically killed during this period. One case in Azerbaijan, that of Elnur Hŭseyinov, has still not been resolved.

On at least one point we have consensus. I thank the rapporteur for the report. More case studies need to be prepared with the same high level of quality. And, of course, we need much better investigations.

Tervikdokument: http://assembly.coe.int/

Resolutsioon: http://assembly.coe.int