KIEV - Ukraine's former president, Petro Poroshenko, landed in Kiev on Monday to face treason charges in a case he says was trumped up by allies of his successor, Mr Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
Mr Poroshenko, 56, is being investigated for alleged treason linked to the financing of Russian-backed separatist fighters through illegal coal sales in 2014 and 2015. He could face 15 years in prison if convicted. His party accused Mr Zelenskiy of a reckless attempt to silence political opposition. During a break in the court session, he told the crowd:"The authorities are confused, weak, and instead of fighting Putin, they are trying to fight us."
"Today we did not win the war, we did not win the battle, but we kept our positions, preventing them from advancing," Mr Poroshenko told the crowd.On Friday, Mr Zelenskiy's chief of staff batted away suggestions that Mr Zelenskiy was behaving like Mr Viktor Yanukovich, a former president who was backed by Russia and whose political rival Yulia Tymoshenko was jailed in a case that Western countries widely condemned as politicised.
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