Former Ukrainian representative to UN: Russia granted Yanukovych’s request to deploy troops in Ukraine an official status of UN Security Council document
An appeal by Viktor Yanukovych to Russian President Vladimir Putin for the use of Russian Armed Forces to restore "constitutional order" in Ukraine was not only read by the Russian representative to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, at a meeting of the UN Security Council, but the Russian side additionally granted this document official UN status, stated the former Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the United Nations, Yuriy Sergeyev, stated this, reports Interfax-Ukraine.
"Yanukoych’s request was not simply read and presented. On the morning of the same day, the Russian Federation gave it the status of an official document of the UN Security Council; such a formula exists," Sergeyev said while giving witness testimony in the Obolonsky District Court of Kyiv on the case of Yanukovych's state representative.
The diplomat noted that Yanukovych’s letter to Putin was circulated among members of the UN Security Council, and that they became familiar with it.
Sergeyev recalled that when answering journalists' question about this appeal, the then representative of France to the United Nations, Gerard Araud, stated that "it’s not a false letter, it [Yanukovych] is a false president."
At the meeting of the UN Security Council on March 3, 2014, Russian representative Vitaly Churkin presented a copy of Yanukovych's letter to Putin with a request to deploy troops to Ukraine. Sergeyev represented Ukraine at that meeting.
Yanukovych has been charged with state treason for sending a written statement on March 1, 2014, while in Russian territory, to the President of the Russian Federation requesting the use of Russian troops on the territory of Ukraine. This subsequently led to Ukraine’s loss of the Crimea and state property worth more than 1,080 trillion hryvnia.
The former president has been accused of state treason (Part 1, Article 111 of the Criminal Code), complicity in separatism (Part 5, Article 27, Part 3, Article 110 of the Criminal Code) and complicity in the conduct of an aggressive war (Part 5, Article 27, Part 2, Article 437 of the Criminal Code).