Jailed former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko has sent a letter to penitentiary officials saying she refuses to wear prison robe and work while in detention.
Tymoshenko was convicted and sentenced to seven years in prison in October 2011 for overreaching her authority in signing a gas deal with Russia in 2009. The deal obliged Ukraine to buy larger amounts of gas than it now needs, and at higher prices than it says is fair. Ukraine has since consistently sought revision of the deal.
“I refuse to comply with all prison regulations, including obligatory work, because I already have a job, I’m the chairman of the Batkyvshchina party,” she said. “I also refuse to wear a prison robe.”
Inmates of the women’s jail in Kharkov where Tymoshenko is being held are allowed to wear casual clothes in their cells, but must put on blue prison robes while working at the jail’s garment factory.
Head of Ukraine’s State Penitentiary Service, Oleksandr Lysytskov, said in late February that under the Ukrainian law, work in penal institutions "is provided for all inmates" except those who can’t work for reasons of age and health.
The former prime minister, however, may be exempt from working in prison for medical reasons. Tymoshenko’s supporters claim her health has deteriorated since her pre-trial detention began in August 2011 and that she is no longer able to walk due to back problems.
Tymoshenko is currently battling fresh charges of financial wrongdoing during her tenure as head of United Energy Systems of Ukraine in the 1990s.
