We are publishing the official statement of Andriy Antonenko’s defenders regarding the release by former Belarusian special services employee Igor Makar of tapes with recordings allegedly from the office of the head of the KGB of Belarus, Vadim Zaitsev, about a direct order to kill Pavel Sheremet, given by the President of the Republic of Belarus in 2012.
The National Police has published a statement on this occasion, which states that the version regarding the perpetrators of this crime (Mr. Antonenko, Dugar, Kuzmenko) remains unchanged. The police allegedly received the relevant tapes from the Foreign Intelligence Service back in December and are now investigating this version regarding the people who ordered the murder.
Let us recall that in the indictment in the case of Mr. Antonenko, Dugar, Kuzmenko, the motive for the murder is formulated as follows:
During 2016, persons who have not been identified by the investigation at this time, materials regarding whom have been allocated to a separate proceeding, acting for a number of personal motives, decided to create an extremely resonant event in society with the aim of further provoking numerous protests. The most effective option for implementing the above was the organization of a premeditated crime in the territory of Kyiv related to the murder of one of the public figures.
Defense attorneys’ statement
- The information published by Igor Makar regarding the preparation of the political assassination of Pavel Sheremet by the KGB of Belarus requires careful verification. We hope that this will be done by the competent authorities of European countries, and not by Ukrainian forgers. The defense is already working in this direction.
- We remind you that the “Belarusian trace” taking into account the political position of Pavel Sheremet should be the highest priority version of the investigation, especially considering that the murder occurred on July 20, the day of Alexander Lukashenko’s first inauguration in 1994, a date that, according to media reports, he unofficially celebrates every year. If the information is confirmed, it completely destroys the insane version of the prosecution about unknown individuals who, when selecting perpetrators with low moral qualities, focused on “volunteer groups of the population.” During the opening speech of Krugovoy’s lawyer, the defense stated that the prosecution’s versions are quite similar to the behavior of a con artist caught red-handed — it consistently puts forward contradictory and sometimes funny theories to justify its own fraud.
- Having carefully studied all the “evidence” presented by the investigation, the defense claims, based on the available materials, that previously the version of the involvement of the Belarusian special services was not investigated or considered at all. Moreover, the minister and his deputies, police chiefs, prosecutors and investigators also constantly forgot about it during their propaganda statements and speeches before legislators and during television shows, trying with all their might to lead the public away from this version. There were words about Russia, and PTSD, and extremism, and schizophrenia of the perpetrators, but there was no mention of Belarus. This cannot but suggest that if the involvement of the Belarusian special services in this murder is confirmed, the question will arise whether the heads of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the National Police did not deliberately cover up both the customers and the perpetrators, pointing to persons who were deliberately not involved and to false versions of the motive, similar to what was done at the beginning of the investigation into the murder of Kateryna Handziuk.
- The National Police of Ukraine and representatives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs today spread false information that the alleged “Belarusian version” of the perpetrators of the murder is new to them and that it does not contradict the charges brought against Mr. Antonenko, Mr. Dugar, and Mr. Kuzmenko. However, this is obvious disinformation. First, the case does not contain any even remote hints of the connection of the accused with any special services, including foreign ones. Secondly, the prosecution calls the goal of the organizers of the crime “the creation of an extremely resonant event in Ukrainian society with the aim of further provoking numerous protest actions.” This is in no way consistent with the version made public today in Brussels.
Defenders of Andriy Antonenko
Dmytro Krugovyi
Vitaly Galenchenko
Stanislav Kulyk
Let us recall that according to the indictment, the best perpetrators of murders with low moral qualities are volunteers.
Read also:
Appeal from Krugovy’s defense attorney regarding Riffmaster’s imprisonment
Допитаний у справі Шеремета Глен Грант: справа Антоненка демонструє серйозні проблеми.