Ukrainian court issues arrest warrant for the head of Crimea
The court issued a warrant for the arrest of Sergey Aksyonov, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine stated. He said that the Prosecutor's Office of Crimea petitioned the arrest of Aksyonov as part of the previously initiated criminal proceedings on the transfer of ownership of the children's camp Artek to Russia, RBC reported.
The report said that Aksyonov was charged with the abuse of power, the establishment of an illegal governing body, according to the Prosecutor's Office, called the "Council of Ministers of the Republic of Crimea", and the transfer of property that belongs to the state enterprise of Ukraine International Children Center Artek to the Russian Federation.
"As a result of the petition of the law enforcement agencies of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, the Pechersk court in Kiev was granted permission to detain the suspect, Sergey Aksyonov, so he could be charged and sentenced," the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office reported.
In addition, the court of the Obolon district in Kiev decided to seize the property of the International Children Center Artek, the report says. The total amount of damage Ukraine sustained as a result of the transfer of Artek to Russia is estimated at more than 242 million hryvnia, Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office added.
Aksyonov himself called the Ukrainian court’s decision of his arrest a "political idiocy". "Despite the fact that their country is a mess, they keep living in a parallel reality. In my opinion, this is another manifestation of the political, jurisdictional and geographical cretinism. I can think of no other explanation," RIA Novosti quotes the statement of the press service of Aksyonov.
The Head of Crimea has also offered Kiev to try and enforce the court's decision. "If the court in Kiev has decided to detain and arrest me, then let them try and execute the decision. What's the problem? They know my address – go ahead and arrest me!" Aksyonov wrote on his Twitter page.
"All of this can only be described as insanity. It is difficult to make a different assessment for such a decision," the Head of the Public Chamber of Crimea, Grigory Ioffe, said to RIA Novosti, commenting on the decision of the Kiev court.
Ukrainian authorities do not recognize the territory of Crimea as Russian, considering it temporarily occupied. Previously, Kiev initiated criminal proceedings against a number of leaders of Crimea. Thus, in addition to Aksyonov, Ukraine also opened proceedings against the Crimean Prosecutor Natalia Poklonskaya. She is charged with "committing acts aimed at violent change or overthrow of the constitutional order or the seizure of state power."