MY FIGHT TO SAVE MY MOTHER Eugenia Tymoshenko had a blessed early life as her mother, Yulia, rose to become prime minister of . Then came the arrest. She tells Tim Bouquet about the bitter fight to get “Lady Yu” out of jail

Photograph Sergey Dolzhenko

ugenia Tymoshenko steps out of a cab in sunny Knightsbridge wearing black high heels, a smart tan skirt and black jacket. She E could be something senior at Goldman Sachs, but her pressing business is about life, death and justice. The 32-year-old is on a campaign to free her mother from a seven-year jail sentence in a Ukrainian prison – and, she says, from physical and mental torture that threatens to kill her. Eugenia’s mother is , the former prime minister of Ukraine, sent to prison after a sequence of events that combines the plot of a revenge thriller with the darkest politics of the era. In October last year, Tymoshenko was found guilty of crimi- nally “abusing her office” in what the United States and European Union have both called a politically motivated show trial. Even Rus- sian president Vladimir Putin criticised the sentence. Since the start of her prison term, her daughter claims, Yulia has been beaten and denied access to a doctor or drugs. She has also been accused – without evidence – Taking of the murder of a fellow MP. Tymoshenko’s a stand: supporters have protested and battled police Eugenia on the streets of Kiev, and Tymoshenko herself Tymoshenko campaigning has gone on hunger strike. Now it seems her for the only hope of freedom is her daughter. release of her Eugenia makes an unlikely saviour. Until mother, Yulia her mother’s sentence, her career was running

20 MAGAZINE | 23.09.12 | THE OBSERVER EUGENIA TYMOSHENKO

an Italian restaurant in Kiev. “I never had any through 15 premiers since that first flush of banks. The rise of UESU was meteoric – some ambition for politics,” she tells me. These days independence. It is a country where politi- said suspicious. By the end of 1996, under Eugenia strides confidently into TV studios for cal alliances are notoriously short-lived the patronage of then-prime minister Pavlo interviews. She talks with poise and passion to and morph very quickly into acrimony and Lazarenko, the company controlled 25% of presidents and prime ministers. She addresses revenge. However, Viktor Yanukovych the Ukrainian economy. According to the meetings of MEPs and briefs lawyers. And she and Yulia Tymoshenko share a history and Ukrainian newspaper Izvestia, UESU was litigates. “Ukraine courts don’t work,” Eugenia a loathing that runs deep even by Ukrainian a kind of a “state within a state”. says. “We have to go overseas.” standards. Did Eugenia or her father not try One of the wealthiest businesspeople in the When we meet she is in London talking to persuade her to stay away from a political country, Tymoshenko entered politics in the to lawyers as she takes action in the British tide that was turning strongly against her? 1990s. Blessed with incredible willpower and courts against Ukraine’s first deputy prosecu- “Ten years ago maybe we could have,” energy – and a hard edge behind her trade- tor. In March, Renat Kuzmin told BBC Ukraine Eugenia says, her dark eyes momentarily star- mark smile – “Lady Yu” could work a crowd that he had “reliable information” that money ing into the middle distance. “But now she sees like nobody else. When a rival in parliament from her mother’s accounts had been trans- her fight as a fight for Ukraine.” claimed that if she sold her pearls they would ferred to pay hitmen who had gunned down raise enough cash to feed an average Ukrainian MP and businessman Yevgen Shcherban, BOR N IN 1960, Yulia Tymoshenko was an family for five years, she ripped off her neck- as well as his wife and his economist and engineer lace and threw it at him. “There’s not a single assistant, at an airport who, with her husband pearl in this necklace,” she shouted. in 1996. “She has never Oleksandr, built a for- Her fall from power was just as dramatic. been questioned, and this The US and EU tune with their now- Five years on from the Orange Revolution, allegation has no basis in called it a politically defunct corporation president Yuschenko’s popularity had van- fact,” Eugenia says, toy- United Energy Systems ished. The 2010 presidency battle was instead ing with her pasta. One motivated show trial. Ukraine (UESU), a gas- fought between the old regime’s Yanukovych senses that this lapsed Even Putin criticised trading concern which and Tymoshenko, with Yanukovych narrowly restaurateur now rarely also included venture prevailing. Tymoshenko challenged the result finishes a meal. the sentence capital firms and two in court and continued to protest even after Eugenia comes across as a mixture of relentless focus – displaying her mastery of the legal and political minefield that confronts her mother – and the restless stress of somebody who wishes that she could wake up to find that this was all a bad dream. Her mother first gained international prominence in 2004 as one of the leaders of the Orange Revolution that freed her coun- try from the Soviet empire. Alongside Viktor Yushchenko, who survived a near-fatal dioxin poisoning attack that disfigured his face, Tymoshenko – famous for her golden blonde braid, worn like a crown around her head, and her wardrobe of expensive peasant chic – was a figurehead for hundreds of thousands of rev- olutionaries who braved sub-zero tempera- tures in Kiev to protest against a fraud-tainted presidential election “won” by Viktor Yanuko- vych. The Supreme Court ordered a rerun and Yushchenko was elected to the presidency. “Those days were incredibly exciting,” says Eugenia. “It seemed like the end of all the political troubles for Ukraine. We could move towards becoming a member of a free and democratic Western Europe.” Yushchenko appointed Eugenia’s mother as prime minister, but their dalliance with democracy and each other did not last long. Eight months later they fell out over bitter accusations of corruption. Yushchenko sacked Tymoshenko during a live TV address to the nation in September 2005 and the following year brought in Viktor Yanu- kovych, of all people, as his new prime minister. Family ties: with her “It was then that I began daughter Eugenia to fear for my mother,” and husband Eugenia says. Oleksandr at the

SERGEYDOLZHENKO/EPA Ukraine has been verdict hearing

THE OBSERVER | 23.09.12 | MAGAZINE 23 EUGENIA TYMOSHENKO the election had been deemed free and fair. her marriage breakdown. When pressed she the web. International opinion began to rally. Yanukovych demanded her resignation as says: “This interview is about my mother.” This February Eugenia met Hillary Clinton prime minister; her government resigned after In December Eugenia was invited to in Washington DC. “She came over as soon as a parliamentary vote of no confidence. address the annual congress of the European she saw me and said: ‘We really support your Almost immediately the justice department People’s Party, the largest centre-right group- mother and we are very worried about her.’ moved against her, reopening an old case of tax ing in the European Parliament, to which her Mrs Clinton is a very warm person. I asked evasion and amassing evidence to put her on mother’s party is aligned. She took to the stage if she could put pressure to get my mother trial for Shcherban’s murder. The case which nervously clutching her speech and faced treated medically. She spoke to Yanukovych made it to the courts first concerned a major 1,000 delegates from 39 countries, including twice and said he had admitted that it was contract signed with Russia in 2009 to import Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel. “It was wrong to deny her medical help.” Two months gas. Tymoshenko was accused of exceeding terrifying!” she remembers. later, prison officers came to Tymoshenko’s her powers by forcing the state company, Naf- Eugenia was concerned about her mother’s cell at 11pm, turned out the lights, wrapped her togaz, to agree to a deal that overpriced the gas, health: Yulia had a herniated disc in her back. in a blanket and took her to hospital in Kharkiv. and of costing the country £120 million. “She is denied painkillers and can no longer Once she was there, photographs showed In July Eugenia was in court to see her walk,” Eugenia told the delegates. “Even severe bruising on her arms and stomach. She mother in the dock and Yushchenko giv- the priest cannot see her. She is suffering alleged she had been beaten en route. ing evidence against tortures. I’m scared that “She was not allegedly beaten,” Eugenia her. Tymoshenko was this torture will continue says fiercely. “She was hit so hard she could found guilty in October until it kills her.” A week not breathe!” Hillary Clinton protested and and ordered to repay ‘My mother was not later a video appeared Tymoshenko herself went on hunger strike the £120m in damages. “allegedly” beaten,’ on Ukrainian TV of for 20 days, losing 10kg. Eugenia was horrified. “Nobody can humiliate Tymoshenko bedridden “I tried to persuade her not to. She was already my honest name,” she says Eugenia. ‘She in prison, a shadow of so weak. But she said: ‘Stay strong!’” insisted as she began her was hit so hard she herself and protesting Eugenia says the endless travelling, lobby- sentence in Women’s at being filmed against ing and media interviews are physically and Prison No 54 in Kharkiv, could not breathe’ her will. It went viral on emotionally draining, but not as stressful as 300 miles east of Kiev. Knowing his own arrest was imminent, her husband Oleksandr fled to the Czech Republic and was granted political asylum. “By the time of my mother’s conviction nearly a dozen of her associates had been arrested and some jailed,” Eugenia says. “To see your mother sent to prison is horrible, unbearable. Equally, I was not surprised. It was Yanukovych’s verdict, not the court’s.” For Eugenia, the key to protecting her mother – and obtaining her release – is keep- ing her fate present on the global stage. For that she had the advantage of an international upbringing. Eugenia had spent nine years in England, boarding at Rugby School and study- ing at LSE. Shielded from Ukraine’s poverty by her family wealth, Eugenia was not immune from her mother’s searing ambition: “She always wanted me to be a good student, to be top of my class. At the beginning it was hard to keep up to her standards.” Eugenia smiles. “My father is not so strict. With him I always found a good ear.” In 2004 she met Sean Carr, a heavily tat- tooed biker from Leeds and aspiring rock singer with the Death Valley Screamers, in a Red Sea bar in Egypt. She married him a year later. Eleven years older than Eugenia, Carr was suddenly ranked the ninth “most influ- ential foreigner in Ukraine” by the Kiev Post. In the land of the Orange Revolution his rock career soared. It did not last. “I got divorced last year,” Eugenia says matter-of-factly. Chil- dren? “No children.” A pause. She will not “To see your mother be drawn on whether sent to prison is campaigning for her horrible. But I’m mother’s release was not surprised”: a contributory factor to Eugenia in London

PHOTOGRAPH KAREN ROBINSON THE OBSERVER | 23.09.12 | MAGAZINE 25 EUGENIA TYMOSHENKO seeing her mother. She might still be in a hos- tries pulled out in protest. Ukraine did co-host change to Ukraine,” Eugenia says, “but she pital but Yulia Tymoshenko is kept in isolation the Euro 2012 football championship in June did not have sufficient instruments to bring it behind three sets of bars. “We hug and hold with Poland, but the British, German, Austrian through and had to focus on problems with the hands but we can only talk in whispers. Her and Belgian governments said that no ministers economy.” However, it was a lack of economic room on the ninth floor is bugged. There are or officials would attend matches in Ukraine. focus that led to Ukraine going broke and hav- three cameras on her 24 hours a day, including Supporters portray Tymoshenko as an ing to limp to the west for loans that killed the her bathroom. She has the same prison guards Aung San Suu Kyi figure. However, her abil- Orange Revolution. who can walk in unannounced at any time. ity to attract and antagonise in equal measure The European Court of Human Rights has She has very limited communication with the makes her more like Benazir Bhutto, twice held an initial public hearing into the “admis- outside world. She could not even call me on prime minister of Pakistan, who was charged sibility and merits in the case of Tymoshenko v my birthday.” Eugenia by her president with Ukraine”. It is now deliberating behind closed pauses. “We do have good corruption and money- doors. It might take months to pronounce, days,” she continues. laundering, and assas- and even if it does find in her favour, a guilty German doctors have Outside the court, sinated in 2007. When verdict in the tax evasion or the murder cases been allowed to treat her Tymoshenko’s Tymoshenko was taken could see Yulia Tymoshenko remain behind mother. “Her back is still from the court to prison bars for many years. painful but her health detractors shouted: her supporters were on Eugenia is convinced that her mother will has improved,” Eugenia ‘Keep her in prison. the street, but so were return to public life. “I think she will be with says. her detractors, shouting: us this year,” she says, although it is unlikely Does Eugenia fear for She’s a thief!’ “Keep her in a prison. that Lady Yu will be free before parliamen- her own safety? “I have She is a thief!” tary elections on 28 October – Tymoshenko never been involved in Eugenia insists that supporters fear they cannot win with their politics or my parents’ business. If Yanukovych her mother is a tireless campaigner against figurehead behind bars. “I don’t worry about goes against me, it will be very obvious,” she repression and corruption. But there are her political life; I worry about her health. We shrugs. “I know they watch me and intercept question marks against Tymoshenko’s own are all fighting for her. My dad and I are send- my calls, but I also know I have done nothing behaviour. According to the respected Wash- ing food and clothes parcels but we are doing wrong. I am in the best position to speak out.” ington-based Freedom House, which visited it separately.” Eugenia misses her family. “In Thanks to Eugenia the Tymoshenko case has Ukraine in 2012, for instance, Yanukovych has May my grandfather died, and I was the only been a PR disaster for Yanukovych’s govern- spent $100m on an extravagant presidential one who could go to his funeral. I just want ment. In May 2012 it had to cancel a meeting retreat. So why in two stints as prime minister us to all be together. of regional leaders at Yalta when Germany, the did Tymoshenko not do something about it? “The government wants the world to forget Czech Republic, and 10 other EU coun- “My mother had a lot of responsibility to bring her. I’m not going to let that happen.” ■

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