Kuchma's former bodyguard Nikolay Melnichenko is interviewed.
Photo: Yuri Gripas
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Major Melnichenko Unveils Another Conspiracy
// This time organized by Boris Berezovsky
Scandal
Maj. Nikolay Melnichenko, former Ukrainian president’s security service officer, said yesterday that a group of individuals led by Boris Berezovsky is implementing a “criminal plan” in order to exert influence on the Ukrainian authorities. Taps made by Mr. Melnichenko in Leonid Kuchma’s office were the foundation of this plan. The Ukrainian security service started verifying this information. Boris Berezovsky, founder of the Civil Liberties Fund, is not going to politicize with Nikolay Melnichenko in public, but is ready to comment this statement to Ukraine’s prosecutors
Nikolay Melnichenko passed over this sensational statement to the head of the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU), Alexander Turchinov, through diplomatic channels. Representatives of the Ukrainian Embassy to the U.S. contacted SBU Wednesday night. Mr. Melnichenko talked to the head of SBU on the phone about his statement on the presence of the diplomats .However, according to the SBU’s head, ex-Major circulated this statement in defiance of the request not to do it until the facts listed there are investigated. The text of the statement was published on the website Obozrevatel and later partially transcribed by Interfax-Ukraine with a notice that the latter cannot guarantee its authenticity.
Nikolay Melnichenko's statement says that Berezovsky’s plan “involves plots and manipulations with some copies of the records of Leonid Kuchma's conversations” which were transferred to head of the Verkhovna Rada's ad hoc inquiry commission Alexander Zhyr in early 2002. “One of the main purposes for this manipulation involving copies of ‘fragments of records’ is Berezovsky's illegal influence on the incumbent Ukrainian authorities for deriving personal profits”, Melnichenko claims.
He says that the history of his relations with Boris Berezovsky has started in March 2005. After the death of the former Ukrainian Interior Minister Yuri Kravchenko, Mr. Melnichenko, who was in Warsaw at that time, gained the information that his life was under threat. After the SBU’s governing body admitted they could not ensure ex-Major’s security in Europe, he accepted the help offered by Boris Berezovsky. “Berezovsky offered me help in the coordination of my lawyers’ work and said he was willing to fund my transportation expenses connected with it,” Melnichenko said.
“But on March 13, 2005 Berezovsky started to force met to illegal actions. He told me that he allegedly had copies of the fragments of the records at his disposal which he received from Zhyr through Yuri Shvets, Zhyr’s former official representative in the U.S.,” the statement runs. Still Mr. Melnichenko maintains that he hasn’t “handed any copies of the fragments of records either to Berezovsky or his people or other individuals.” He says that he gave the copies of the records exclusively to Alexander Zhyr.
“Berezovsky offered me a share participation in the distribution of US $1 billion which Berezovsky would allegedly receive from Kuchma’s entourage for shifting from Kucha responsibility for the crimes committed by him against Georgy Gongadze and Alexander Elyashkevich. Besides, Berezovsky claimed that in case I agree, he will be able to influence the new Ukrainian leadership on the economic and political decision-making, and in this case he will settle all my problems with the Ukrainian leaders,” Nikolay Melnichenko says.
“After my categorical refusal he told me that in this case his people would launch the mechanism of my public discredit. In particular, they will announce that they bought the copies of the records way back in 2002. Berezovsky and his entourage blackmail me that they will reveal financial documents of rendering me financial aid in 2002 and announce that this money was allegedly allotted to pay for those materials which they have as well,” presidential security service ex-office says.
Thereby, Mr. Melnichenko has made a request for the head of SBU to immediately clamp down on the illegal activities of Boris Berezovsky and his structures, to evaluate his actions in terms of law and to inform president Yushchenko of the situation. Moreover, Nikolay Melnichenko demanded that the inventory of the materials transferred to Mr. Zhyr should be carried out. If the information that Berezovsky obtained these documents is confirmed, then a criminal case should be initiated against Alexander Zhyr, Melnichenko demands.
To all appearances, the cause that prompted Nikolay Melnichenko to make a public statement was a recent publication of an interview with Boris Berezovsky in Gazeta Po-Kyivsky daily, in which Berezovksy said that he had copies of all the records made by Maj. Melnicheko in president Kuchma’s office. In addition, he said that his Civil Liberties Fund is ready to give the public all the decodings of the records at his disposal.
Meanwhile, Alexander Goldfarb, head of the Civil Liberties Fund, explained his stance in an interview with Svoboda Radio, the fund’s press release being sent to the media editorial two days before. Alexander Goldfarb says several years his organization has been financing Melnichenko’s activities in the U.S. where ex-Major was granted political asylum. Melnichenko for the first time turned to Berezovsky in April 2002 asking for financing. Then he was given more than $50,000 through the mediation of a historian Yuri Felshtinsky, and, as Mr. Goldafarb maintains, Nikolay Melnichenko handed to Mr. Felshtinsky copies of all Leonid Kuchma’s wiretapping that he had at his disposal and other covering materials.
A group of Ukrainian opposition leaders, independent from Nikolay Melnichenko, represented by Yuri Shvets who lives in Washington turned to Boris Berezovsky in mid-2002. They also had the tapes of Leonid Kuchma’s telephone conversations. The fund financed the authenticity expertise and decoding of the records, including those obtained by Yuri Felshtinsky from Nikolay Melnichenko. The part of the deciphered records was later published at the 5the Element website created specially for it. As the fund claims, while financing Melnichenko and Shvets’ group, Boris Berezovsky neither imposed any conditions, nor controlled their activities.
Kommersant correspondent contacted Boris Berezovsky but the latter wouldn’t discuss Nikolay Melnichenko’s statement. “I don’t want to start politicizing with him [Melnychenko. – Kommersant]. I am ready to comment on this statement to the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office,” Mr. Berezovsky said. He clarified some points, though. “Who was the initiator of Mr. Melnichenko’s leaving Warsaw in early March 2004 after the sudden death of the ex-Ukrainian Interior Minister Yuri Kravchenko?” Kommersant correspondent asked. “He called me saying his life was in danger and asked to promptly send a jet and body-guards for him. It wasn’t an airplane business class ticket he was asking for, but a jet. I guess, my answer for this questions clarifies the situation on the whole,” Boris Berezovsky pointed out.
As for Nikolay Melnichenko, he was unavailable for comment yesterday. His wife Lilia answered his home phone promising to tell her husband about Kommersant’s request for an interview. One of his mobile phones wouldn’t answer, the other turned on the answering machine.
Alexander Reutov
All the Article in Russian as of Apr. 01, 2005
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