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Thousands sign Polish 'free Tymoshenko' petition

PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge 07.05.2012 14:25
Former Polish PM Tadeusz Mazowiecki and film-maker Andrzej Wajda are among several thousand to have signed a petition calling for the release of Yulia Tymoshenko ahead of Euro 2012.

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The Polish petition comes amid a flurry of declarations by international dignitaries who say they will boycott Ukraine during the forthcoming Euro 2012 football tournament, an event which Poland is co-hosting with its eastern neighbour.

“Poland cannot call for and take part in a boycott,” the appeal states, contradicting a call from Polish opposition leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski for politicians to do just that.

“The voice of Polish civil society is therefore all the more important. Ukrainians must hear that Poland is on the side of Ukraine’s freedom and not on the side of those who are trampling that freedom," says the petition.

Yulia Tymoshenko was one of the leading lights in the Orange Revolution that swept across Ukraine in the winter of 2004, twice serving as prime minister since then.

She was sentenced to seven years in jail on 11 October 2011 for “exceeding her powers” by pushing through a deal with Russian gas giant Gazprom in 2009.

Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Poland's first prime minister after the fall of communism, has said that the imprisonment looks “more and more like straightforward political revenge” by current Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych.

International dignitaries who have threatened to boycott Euro 2012 games in the Ukraine include Jose Barroso, president of the European Commission, Meanwhile, five European presidents have declined to attend a summit for Central European states this week in Yalta.

The appeal to release Tymoshenko was written by former dissident Adam Michnik, editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza.

'Keep politics out of sport'

Mikolaj Piotrowski, spokesman for the PL.2012 company which is organising the tournament in Poland, told Reuters, Monday, however: “I don’t think that a boycott of a social and sporting event is the best way to communicate with the Ukrainian authorities

“There must be other ways,” he added, “without boycotting an event expected by millions of people here in Poland and Ukraine.”

“We found resources, improved the stadiums, built airports, roads and bridges. Now we hear calls for a boycott of the championship. How should we react after they insult us,” Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov remarked.

German coach Joachim Loew echoed Uefa's stance concerning the threats, saying at a press conference on Monday that a boycott “clearly does not make sense.”

While expressing his hopes that “something good” comes out of the media attention on Tymoshenko, Loew said that the tournament should be about “fun, joy, integration” and “bringing people together.”

Poland's president, Bronislaw Komorowski, has appealed for dignitaries not to go ahead with any Euro 2012 boycott, a stance echoed by the Polish government. (nh/pg)

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