SIMFEROPOL, October 19 (RIA Novosti) - The director of a major children's holiday camp on Ukraine's Black Sea coast has said that he wants to be questioned as soon as possible over allegations that children were sexually abused at the camp.
The Artek camp in the Crimea has been the focus of Ukrainian media reports since October 13, when Vadim Kolesnichenko, a lawmaker from Ukraine's opposition Party of Regions, said two siblings had been raped at the camp, and that top officials were involved in the abuse.
Artek general director Boris Novozhilov was hospitalized Saturday with heart problems after police officers searched the apartments of some of his relatives in Kiev in connection with the case.
"I insist that I be subjected to questioning as soon as possible, and I am ready to meet with an investigator in the hospital," the camp's press service quoted him as saying.
Novozhilov also said all suspects in the case should be tested with a lie detector, and called for "influential international experts whose reputations are beyond question" to be brought into the investigation.
Ukrainian media said three unnamed members of parliament are suspected of involvement in the abuse, but that they have denied the allegations. According to police, one man who is suspected of sexually assaulting his own children in the camp has been detained.
Located in the southern Crimea not far from the city of Yalta, Artek is famous as the main Soviet-era pioneer camp, which welcomed children all year round since the 1930s and even worked during World War II, when the center moved to Altai. The camp closed this winter due to financial problems, but resumed its work in February.
