Poroshenko’s lawyer Ilya Novikov: three Supreme Court judges turned a blind eye to the falsification of sanctions documents
Lawyer Ilya Novikov published a detailed analysis of the openly political decision of the panel of judges of the Cassation Administrative Court of the Supreme Court, which refused to lift the sanctions against Petro Poroshenko. As is known, this decision, after a year and a half of red tape, was supported by three out of five judges, with the presiding judge Radyshevska and judge Smokovich disagreeing with the majority and expressing their separate opinions.
This was reported by the press service of “European Solidarity” .
“Today we will analyze two elements of this puzzle: how the court reacted to the falsification of evidence by state bodies and what the court thinks about the impact of sanctions on the elections. Because blocking accounts and prohibiting transactions as a sanction restriction excludes registration by a candidate due to the inability to provide the CEC with all the documents required by law. Therefore, the incumbent president can remove any of his rivals from the elections through sanctions – he has already removed Poroshenko, Zaluzhny and the new favorite Fedorov are waiting for their turn. It is already known that 3 out of 5 judges agreed with this and believe that this is how it should be, but are you curious how they explain it? I was curious,” Novikov said.
He explained in detail that the documents on the basis of which Poroshenko was included in the sanctions decree were prepared in a hurry and contained many errors. Including the decree of President Zelensky himself, there were factual errors regarding three out of five persons appearing in it. As is known, journalists were the first to expose these errors, so on February 13, when Zelensky was no longer in Ukraine, the decision on sanctions was illegally replaced.
Novikov also recalled that the authorities delayed providing the court with all documents in the case for six months, and when they were finally provided, it turned out that the key documents were prepared retrospectively, that is, after the NSDC decision.
“The NSDC refused to go to court at all (they always refuse in cases about sanctions, although formally it is their decision that is being appealed). The grounds: the NSDC as such is not a legal entity and cannot participate in the process, the NSDC apparatus is a legal entity, but it does not make decisions about sanctions, so decide without us, your honor. The Cabinet of Ministers does not participate in sanctions processes so often – because most sanctions are initiated by the SBU. In our case, the initiative came from the CMU, and they had to respond. In the first package of documents (all marked “for official use”), they provided the court with two versions of the draft order on sanctions dated February 12, 2025, both signed by the Minister of Economy Yulia Svyrydenko – the “original”, registered at 5:40 p.m., and “revised based on the results of comments at the CMU meeting” – registered at 7:47 p.m. The annexes to it were documents on approval from various ministries, which “They were received by the Ministry of Economy after 7:47 p.m., or even the next day,” Novikov emphasized.
“The court was provided with a fake DVD, which was deliberately recorded the next day, February 13, when the media noticed that the published decree incorrectly indicated Poroshenko’s tax number, Medvedchuk’s citizenship, and Zhevago’s year of birth. The OP, the CMU, and the NSDC panicked and couldn’t think of anything better than to simply change the text of the already signed decree with incorrect data to the correct one. A lot of people were involved,” the lawyer stated.
“But the main thing that gives away the fake is not the difference in time, but the difference in content. The justification for Poroshenko’s sanctions clearly stated: “The pre-trial investigation established that Poroshenko Petro Oleksiyovych, while holding the position of President of Ukraine, acted in a prior conspiracy with Medvedchuk V.V….” There was nothing easier than copying the text of the justification from the section on Poroshenko and pasting it into the section on Medvedchuk. But there was no time to think, and another text appeared in the Medvedchuk section, where there was no place for “Medvedchuk’s partner” Poroshenko at all,” Novikov added.
He noted that this DVD is a deliberate forgery, which was created on February 13, 2025 after 5:14 p.m. and transferred to the National Security and Defense Council by 11:13 p.m. as the original package of documents, allegedly sent at 7:56 p.m. on February 12.
“This simultaneously excludes the possibility of speaking about compliance with the legal procedure, and confirms that what happened was what the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court calls “arbitrariness” in the legal sense – the decision was “unfounded, discriminatory, or adopted for a purpose other than that established by law. No one engages in falsifications to protect a legal and justified decision,” Novikov emphasized.
However, despite the blatant obviousness of these falsifications, the three judges in their decision describe these documents as authentic.
“The majority judges (Kashpur, Melnyk-Tomenko, Macedonska) mention the disk EN/11-25DSK simply as one of the materials that does not confirm anything unusual, except that our president is doing well, and that everything happened according to the law and procedure. The court did not show any signs of indignation that it was brought an obvious forgery and was being lied to. It did not take an interest in who created it and why. It is simply like a stone in a swamp,” the lawyer said.
Novikov noted that “when you already know the answer to the first question, ‘what the court thinks about forged evidence,’ it will be easier for you to guess what the court thinks about the president’s right to remove election competitors with sanctions.”
“Yes, you guessed it. He doesn’t think anything. The impact of the “ban on transactions” on the elections is not mentioned at all in the decision – including the omission of it in paragraph 40, which briefly states the arguments of the lawsuit. It only mentions that, in the plaintiff’s opinion, the sanctions have a hidden purpose of persecuting him as a leader of the political opposition – and the majority of the court no longer returns to this topic,” noted Ilya Novikov.
He added that Judge Smokovich’s separate opinion draws attention to the political context of the relationship between plaintiff Poroshenko and defendant Zelensky.
“Although the main motive for his disagreement with the majority is that Judge Smokovich considers the sanctions to be unfounded facts (and this is also true) – which removes other issues, because unfounded sanctions cannot be lawful by definition, regardless of other aspects. For us, this separate opinion is important, as is the second separate opinion of Judge Radyshevska – which also agrees with the factual unfoundedness of the NSDC decision,” the lawyer explained.
At the same time, two separate opinions in the Supreme Court’s decision in the case of lifting sanctions – this has never happened before.
“This is not football, where the score is 5:0, 4:1 or 3:2 – it’s still a defeat. Our appeal has already been registered by the Grand Chamber, and the balance of votes there may turn out to be completely different. And if the proceedings are, as we insist, open, the issue of fraud, as well as the issue of limiting democratic procedures by sanctions, will be among the main ones,” he concluded.
Previously, Petro Poroshenko’s lawyers reported that the decision of the panel of judges of the Cassation Administrative Court within the Supreme Court in the case of Petro Poroshenko’s lawsuit regarding sanctions was made under pressure.
We will remind that the chairwoman of the Supreme Court’s panel of judges in the Administrative Court of Cassation, Olesya Radyshevska, believes that the sanctions against Poroshenko are illegal and should be canceled . She set out her arguments in a separate opinion to the court’s decision, which rejected the fifth President’s lawsuit by three votes.
Also follow “Pryamim” on Facebook , X , Telegram , and Instagram.