Former MP Kuzmin ordered arrested in absentia, with no bail option – DBR
Renata Kuzmin was deprived of his deputy mandate and citizenship (Photo:dsnews.ua)
A court has ordered the arrest of former MP Renat Kuzmin without the possibility of bail, the press service of the State Bureau of Investigation, known by its Ukrainian acronym DBR, reported on March 24, adding that the court’s ruling had been made in absentia.
The DBR noted that Kuzmin is suspected of treason.
An investigation has established that he disseminated propaganda materials in the mass media that were harmful to the country, both before and after the commencement of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the DBR said.
Kuzmin made propaganda-based claims in his speeches and expressed them on social media. The intention was to undermine the state’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, inviolability, and security by instilling a negative attitude toward Ukraine in society and through informational manipulation, the DBR said.
The actions of the former MP can be prosecuted under Part 1 of Art. 111 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (treason). He faces up to 15 years in prison, with the confiscation of property.
Kuzmin fled Ukraine after the Revolution of Dignity and was declared wanted. In 2014, criminal proceedings were opened against him due to the illegal detention of Yuriy Lutsenko in 2010.
In the parliamentary elections of 2019, he was elected a MP on the list of the outlawed Opposition Platform – For Life (OPZZh) party, after which the police took him off the wanted list.
Currently, the authorities are trying to determine the whereabouts of Kuzmin, and in October of last year, they carried out over ten searches at locations where he might have been staying.
Earlier this year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stripped Kuzmin of his Ukrainian citizenship.
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