As further attested by the accompanying video, your attempt to install Viktor Yanukovych to rule Ukraine constitutes a disservice to Ukraine, a discredit to your administration, and a stain on Russia.

The information related by Varvara Ovdiy acquires significance not only from its revealing that Viktor Yanukovych was possessed of a criminal temperament from an early age, but also from its reminding us that a second criminal conviction followed the first one that is spoken of, and finally from its rendering more plausible the supposition that protracted Yanukovych criminality has placed in your hands enough blackmail material to be able to control him.  Important too is that Viktor Yanukovych's integrity is brought into question by his denying his criminal past.

�� ���� �������� ��� ������ ���� ���������� ��������� � ���������� (²���) 19.11.2004 18:53:42 (�������� � 21:37)	Yet another testimonial about the past of a twice-convicted candidate for President (VIDEO) 19-Nov-2004 18:53:42 (updated at 21:37)
���� ������� ���� �������� � ���� ���� �������� ���������� �� ������� ������ ��� 17-����� ���������� � ���곺����.	Mrs Varvara Ovdiy confirms that she was a people's lay assessor at the first trial of 17-year-old Yanukovych in Enakiev.
������� ����, �������� ��������� ���곺������� ������� ���� � 60-� �����:	Varvara Ovdiy people's lay assessor of the Enakiev municipal court in the 1960s:
� �� �����, ��� ����� �������������, � �� ����� �� ���곺��, � � �� �������, �� �������, ��������, ��� � �����!  �� � ���� ������� � ���� �� ��� �������, ������ � ���� ��������, �����.	� That gang roamed for a long time, and not only around Enakiev, but also around Gorlovke, around Zhdanov, Donetsk, everywhere � a gang!  They were a curse on us � they pulled wristwatches off hands, tore earrings off ears, snatched hats off heads.
�� ���� ��������, � ���� ������� ����� 2-3 ��� � ������ ������������.  ���� ��������, � ��...	If you televise me, they will come in 2-3 days and tear my head off.  They'll take me away somewhere, into a forest....
�� ������ ���� ����� ������ �� ������ ������� ������ ����������.	Only insane people could elect such a President.
��� ��� �������� ��� ������������ �������, ���������� �� �� ��������, �� �� ��������� ������ ����� �������.	Mr Yanukovych himself has more than once sworn, unmindful of his two convictions, that he has absolutely never broken the law.
����������� ����:	Click to play video:
Varvara Odviy's statement appears above on tinted background.  Remaining text is that of Channel 5. Originally published on the Channel 5 web site at www.5tv.com.ua/newsline/119//2612

Your helping make Ukraine a place where an old woman must fear for her life for speaking the truth about the gangster that you have installed to rule her can be expected neither to promote Ukrainian-Russian friendship nor to remove European squeamishness at the thought of shaking Kremlin hands.

Russians, Ukrainians, Europeans may also wonder at your willingness to write into the historical record your alliance with a man who at one time found employment in tearing earrings off women's ears, an action which would have had consequences such as the following:

Healed unreconstructed		Incomplete tear		Sutured		Sutured

Perhaps if you had shared the fate of some of Viktor Yanukovych's victims, you would not today be so ready to install him as President of Ukraine, but rather would be echoing Varvara Ovdiy's opinion that "Only insane people could elect such a President."